History of Fresno County, California, with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the county who have been identified with its growth and development from the early days to the present, Volume I, Part 134

Author: Vandor, Paul E., 1858-
Publication date: 1919
Publisher: Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company
Number of Pages: 1362

USA > California > Fresno County > History of Fresno County, California, with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the county who have been identified with its growth and development from the early days to the present, Volume I > Part 134

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Mr. and Mrs. Miles have had no children of their own but after the death of Mr. Miles' brother, William, they took his son and daughter, Dial and Velma, and have given them the same love and care they would give to their own children. Mr. Miles is a member of the Reedley Lodge of Odd Fellows and Rebekahs, his wife having passed the chairs of the latter order, of which she is an active member. He is also a member of the Woodmen of the World. They are Republicans on national issues, but in local matters they vote for the best men and measures. They are both strong advocates of the possibilities of Fresno County, where the greater part of their lives has been spent.

MRS. HELEN KRUSE .- What a woman can do in the business world when she is called upon to take the rudder and guide the tossing ship is illustrated in the case of Mrs. Helen Kruse, one of the ablest heads of an enterprise in Fresno County. She was born at La Chaux-de-Fonds. Canton Neuchatel, Switzerland, the daughter of William Brutsch, also a native of that place and a member of an old family there, although her grandfather came from Schaffhousen, in Switzerland, near the banks of the Rhine. Her father was a jeweler and watchmaker, and he married Sophia Neunschwan- ger, who was born at the same place, and died in 1886, the mother of 54

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two children-Charles, who resides at San Jose, and Helen, the subject of this sketch.

In 1881 William Brutsch came to the United States, settling for a while in Chicago, where he managed a laundry, running the same on new and satis- factory lines for five years, and making of it a success. Soon after the middle of the eighties he resolved to move further westward and came to Califor- nia; and once in this state, he was not long in learning that there was one county offering the best inducements to the stranger. In Fresno he started a laundry in the Darling Addition, under the name of the Cosmopolitan Laundry. In 1891, Mr. Brutsch's two children joined him, and later the father went to San Francisco, and thence to Santa Rosa, where he em- barked in the hotel business, finally returning to Fresno to continue running a hostelry. Afterwards he bought a farm; but selling it later, he retired and now resides in Santa Monica.

Born the younger of the two children, and reared in Switzerland until her eleventh year, when she came to Fresno, in 1891, Miss Helen Brutsch was married in Fresno, in April, 1898, to Mr. Gustav Kruse, a native of Enger, Westphalia, and brother of Henry Kruse. The youngest in his fam- ily, he came to the United States and for two years lived and worked in Nebraska, after which he came to California, where he was soon busy as a vineyardist. First, he was foreman on the Anita vineyard, under Hector Burness. During this time, he bought various pieces of acreage, set the same out with vines, and otherwise improved the property. He began with twenty acres, bought twenty more, and later added still another twenty- the old August Halemeier place, onto which he moved. Now they have sixty acres given to a fine vineyard and alfalfa, and are growing table and raisin grapes. and getting several crops of alfalfa a year. This success in the viticultural field has led them to become active members of the California Associated Raisin Company.

Two children, Elsie and Wilma, both students at the Fresno High School, have come to add to the attractiveness of the Kruse home circle. Outside her home, Mrs. Kruse is most devoted to the affairs of the German Lutheran Church of Fresno and its Ladies' Aid Society, of which she was secretary and is now treasurer. Mrs. Kruse's life and work, therefore, pre- sents the case of an all-around woman, well fitted for business, society or philanthropy, and acceptable wherever she appears.

LAURITZ LAURITZEN .- The life story of Lauritz Lauritzen has all the elements of a romance of today. In it is shown the building of a fortune, not by a miracle, a Scheherezade transformation, but by the steady day-by- day industry and thrift of an honest man, endowed with the foresight and business acumen for which the Danish race are noted. Lauritz Lauritzen was born October 6, 1867, near Apenrade, Schleswig, Germany, at that time a part of Denmark. His father, Laua Lauritzen, was a sailor, and came to America, the land of promise, crossed the plains to California, and engaged in mining in El Dorado County, together with three brothers. He met with success and, returning to his native land, bought a ship and engaged in coast trade until his death, at the age of fifty-two. His wife, formerly Mata Krag, was born in Schleswig also, and there her death occurred.

Lauritz Lauritzen was raised in the old seaport town of Gjenner, and was educated in the common school of his home city. At the age of fifteen he was apprenticed to the blacksmith's trade, and followed it in the old coun- try. In 1889 he came to the United States, locating first at Racine, Wis., where he worked in the factory of Fish Brothers Wagon Company one year. At the end of that time, in 1890, he came to Fresno, landing here with but a few dollars left of his savings. He secured employment in the Scandinavian Colony, six miles east of Fresno, for seventy-five cents per day, walking to and from his work each day. Jobs were scarce and wages low in those days,

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and the lad was glad to take any honest work offered him. Later he worked for H. Ahrensberg, the blacksmith, and then for G. Brainard, in a shop where now is located his present business. Determined to succeed, he builded for the future, and was soon able to buy real estate, his first purchase being the lots on the corner of H and Fresno Streets, where he erected a building and, in partnership with H. Ahrensberg, ran a blacksmith shop. After seven years as partner, Mr. Lauritzen bought out the other half-interest, and formed the Lauritzen Implement Company. This business which was started twenty-three years ago, in 1896, in a little blacksmith shop on the corner where the present store now stands, has shown a steady and substantial growth with each year, until today it stands as one of the leading institutions of its kind in Central California. This phenomenal growth can be attributed to the personal efforts of Mr. Lauritzen, who from the very beginning adopted the policy of efficient service; and that this has brought results is best ex- emplified by the large and increasing business that is constantly being done. The new building, located at the corner of Fresno and H Streets, where the little blacksmith shop formerly kept the anvils ringing, was erected pur- posely for the business. It is of brick, has two floors and a basement, com- prising more than 67,500 square feet of floor space, and is a model structure for a business of this kind. The company is engaged in the manufacture of farm implements of all kinds, auto bodies, etc., and is agent for the I. H. C. engines, Moline plow goods, Fish Bros. wagons and McCormick mowers and rakes. In the workshop, the company does general repairing of all kinds, and in the various departments in connection with the business sixty people are employed. A large and comprehensive stock of all goods handled is kept on hand at all times. During the past year the company's business showed an increase of seventy-five percent. over that of the preceding year, and reached a grand total of $250,000. From present indications, even this figure will be increased in the season to come. The Lauritzen Implement Company is an incorporated concern, with the following officers: Lauritz Lauritzen, president and general manager; Robert Prather, vice-president; and Marie Lauritzen, secretary.

Besides his business interests, Mr. Lauritzen is engaged in horticulture, owning a thirty-acre orchard five miles east of Fresno, planted to figs, now three-year-old trees; and he also has other real estate interests in the city. Preeminently a self-made man, in the best sense of that often misused word, he has taken part in all movements for the upbuilding of Fresno; the growth of his business has kept step with the phenomenal growth of his city, and it has been a matter of pride with Mr. Lauritzen to be in the vanguard of progress in the community where he has "builded his house." Fraternally, he is a Mason, a member of Fresno Lodge, No. 267, F. & A. M., and has gone through all the branches of Masonry, up to and including the Shrine of San Francisco. He is also a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, both lodge and encampment; and of the Dania Society of Califor- nia, of which order he is past president. Together with the other leading business men of Fresno, he belongs to the local Chamber of Commerce.

The marriage of Mr. Lauritzen, which occurred in Fresno, October 6, 1892, united him with Anna Christine Jorgensen, a native of Shelland, Den- mark. Nine children have been born to them. as follows: Louisa, an artist of ability ; Laura, a musician of splendid voice and training; and Alice, Walter, William, Robert, James, Louis and Hubert-all born in Fresno. Mr. and Mrs. Lauritzen celebrated their silver wedding in 1917, after twenty- five years of happy married life. They and their family are among the repre- sentative citizenry of Fresno County. Since June, 1918, they have been domi- ciled in their palatial residence at Blackstone and Florodora Streets, where they continue to receive their many friends and dispense a wholesome old- time hospitality.

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BENJAMIN CASSIUS THOMAS .- A very successful farmer and viti- culturist who was also in his time an expert carpenter, is Benjamin Cassius Thomas, who came to California about the middle of the eighties. He was born in Fulton, Callaway County, Mo., on June 21, 1855. His father, John P. Thomas, was born in Kentucky, September 4, 1834; and while yet a babe he came with his parents to Missouri, and grew up on a farm in Callaway County. In Missouri he married Elizabeth Craghead, a daughter of that state, of Scotch descent, and a member of a family well situated as farmer folk.

In 1863, Mr. and Mrs. Thomas, with their three children, crossed the plains in an ox team train, traveling to Austin, Nev. They stopped there intending only to rest their cattle, but they stayed twenty years. Mr. Thomas became interested in stock-raising and farming, and had three different cattle ranges where he owned the water. Under the brand T the Thomas ranches were well and favorably known. In 1883, Mr. Thomas sold out and came to Fresno County, California, where he had a brother-in-law, James Craghead. Through him he became interested in fruit-raising, and bought eighty acres situated four miles northeast of Fresno, for which he paid $100 an acre. He gave this his time and his best efforts, and the first year put out about forty-five acres of vines, increasing the amount later until he had all his property in vines or alfalfa. He also set out five acres of peaches. In 1897 he went to Porterville, but later he returned to Fresno County, and then engaged in dairy ranching near West Park.

The year 1913 brought to Mr. Thomas' home its full measure of sorrow. On Blackstone Avenue, while driving to town alone, his devoted wife was killed in a railroad accident. After this tragedy Mr. Thomas sold his dairy and all his acreage except forty acres, and retired from active work, there- after residing with his son, Benjamin, until his death on his old home place, on January 2, 1916. He was a highly esteemed member of the Methodist Church and popularly active in the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. Three children came to bless the home circle of Mr. and Mrs. John P. Thomas. Luella is Mrs. Hayes, of Porterville : Mattie T. has become Mrs. Williams, of Portland ; and Benjamin Cassius is the subject of our story.

In his eighth year Benjamin Cassius Thomas crossed the plains with his parents, and helped drive the ox team, making the long journey into Nevada without serious Indian troubles. There he went to school, and in his spare time gave such attention to the management of horses that he soon learned to ride the range after the cattle, to lasso them, and to break the bronchos. He continued with his father until he was twenty-one, and was then appointed deputy sheriff. This was in 1877, and he was under J. C. Harper, the well-known county officer. Mr. Harper died and Benjamin Thomas was appointed to succeed him in 1879. In 1880, he was elected sheriff by a large majority, and he was the youngest sheriff who ever took the office in Nevada. He was a good officer, who went hard after evil-doers, and he made some notable captures. In 1883, too, he was sergeant-at-arms of the Senate in Nevada, and served the term.

Mr. Thomas located in Healdsburg in 1884 and bought eighty acres near Lytton Springs, where he set out a vineyard and orchard. Three years later he sold out and located in Fresno, where he assisted his father for a couple of years. He went to Merced County in 1889, and set out a big vine- yard at Atwater for the Merced Land & Fruit Company. At the end of two years he returned to Fresno, where he was appointed a deputy sheriff under Jay Scott, which office he held for five years, or until the end of his last term. Then he went into the employ of the Church Ditch Company, at the same time acting as deputy under Sheriff Collins for a couple of years more. Re- turning to his trade of carpenter, he engaged in local contracting and build- ing until the big fire in San Francisco drew him to the afflicted city. He was

D. M. Musída

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one of the first foreman for building there, and soon went into contracting and building for himself. He erected many structures in San Francisco and Oakland, and resided in the latter place.

In 1914, Mr. Thomas came back to Fresno as the administrator of his mother's estate. After his father's death he was also administrator of his father's estate. He now owns thirty acres of the old homestead, and is inter- ested in forty acres near West Park. He has ten acres of alfalfa. and the balance is in muscat vineyards. He has recently put in a splendid pumping plant with a twelve horse-power engine, and through its use he secures per- fect irrigation. As might be expected, he is a member of the California Associated Raisin Company.

While in Nevada Mr. Thomas was married to Miss Mamie Eames, a native of San Francisco, by whom he had four children. Presley is in Sacra- mento ; Kenneth was in the Ninety-first Division of the United States Army. serving overseas, and went through the Argonne campaign. After about one year's service, he returned home and was honorably discharged; and he is now again a member of the Oakland fire department. Margaret and Edith also reside in Oakland. Mr. Thomas is a member of the Knights of Pythias. In national politics he is a Democrat.

JASPER NEWTON MUSICK .- A pioneer of wonderful vitality and most exemplary character, in whose death Fresno County lost one of its most highly-esteemed citizens, was Jasper Newton Musick, who was born near Jefferson City, Mo., the son of Abraham Musick, of Scotch-Irish blood. The elder Musick hailed from Wayne County, W. Va., whence he removed, while yet a lad, to Kentucky. On coming of age, he became a citizen of Mis- souri, and at a period when St. Louis was a small trading-post, he purchased farm-land and so improved his holding that at the time of his death he had 400 acres under a high state of cultivation. He married Nancy Davis, a de- scendant of English ancestry and a native of Kentucky. A Democrat of the old school and a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church South, Mr. Mu- sick did what he could to advance the high standard of American citizenship and also to raise the moral standards in ordinary, everyday life. He attained to ninety-three years, and his wife lived to be eighty-five. They had fifteen children, twelve of whom grew up. Jeremiah. after the Civil War became a stockman operating extensively and died in January, 1904, after laying out an addition near Fresno. Thomas, another son, died on one of Jasper's farms.

Jasper Newton was the sixth in the order of birth, and while being brought up on his father's farm, attended the old-time log schoolhouse. When seven- teen years of age, he crossed the plains to California with his brother Chesley, and arrived in the Golden State in the fall of 1850. They traveled to Salt Lake with ox teams, but there swapped their slower means of locomotion for horses. They experienced an eye-opening surprise, however, on arriving at Hangtown, to find that the purchaser of the oxen had arrived several days previous, with his brown steeds in better condition than were the frailer horses.

Once somewhat settled, Mr. Musick tried his luck with the gold-miner's pick, and for six years in Amador County met wth varying success. In 1856. he moved to what was at that time Mariposa County but soon afterward Fresno. His ambition to follow peaceful pursuits was rudely interfered with by a call to arms against the Indians, and he was among the first to volunteer to meet the redskins at the Tule River, where they were defeated and dis- persed. After a while he took up teaming between Millerton and Stockton and the mines, making the round trip in ten days and receiving five cents a pound for his freight. In 1858 he had a contract to carry the soldiers from Fort Miller, but he soon gave that up in order to form a partnership with John G. Simpson in the stock business at Dry Creek. They had a meat market at Millerton and drove their cattle, as did so many stockmen of that time to

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Sonora and the mines, as there they could command the highest prices. After a very successful partnership, Messrs. Musick and Simpson in 1865 dissolved, but Mr. Musick continued his sheep business at what later became the site of Letcher. He came to own some 800 acres, all finely improved, and devoted mostly to short-horn cattle and the growing of hay.

In 1892, Mr. Musick left the country and took up his residence in Fresno. He erected residences, came to own city land of value, and at Millerton owned certain acreage of more value because of some high-grade sulphur springs, on the road to the Yosemite, where he had a summer residence.

Mr. Musick was twice married. His first wife was Miss Rebecca Rich- ards, and they were married at Dry Creek, where also occurred her decease. She was born at Millerton, and was a daughter of James Richards, a pioneer. Three of their five children reached maturity: Mary Effie became the wife of William Henderson of Fresno; Nancy Ann is Mrs. J. P. Fincher of Clovis ; and Laura Isabelle is the wife of Benjamin Sims of Fresno. The second Mrs. Musick was Nancy Jane Messersmith, a native of Cole County, Mo., who sur- vives him.

As a prominent and influental Democrat, Mr. Musick for two terms served as supervisor and as chairman of the board, and he was one of the foremost backers of the movement, carried out while he was in office, to change the county seat from Millerton to Fresno, contending that the seat of local government should be on the railroad. He also had an honorable part in the erection of the county court house. He was one of the sponsors of the fine private academy at Dry Creek, afterward deeded to the school district of which Mr. Musick was trustee for years. He was an Odd Fellow and a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church South.

Mr. Musick died at his home in Fresno, on June 4, 1918, in his eighty- sixth year, hale and hearty to the last, and attending to his business affairs until almost the hour he was called to lay aside earthly matters. He was known throughout the county, and particularly by the pioneers, as Uncle Jess, and was distinguished as one of the known eleven living, oldest in years and in continuous residence, of those that were in the territory before the formation, out of the mother county Mariposa, of Fresno County, in 1856. He felt that in early life his advantages had been limited, and probably this nerved him to that greater endeavor by which he became such a splendid example of successful American manhood.

JAMES NATHAN MAXWELL .- An interesting old-timer who for years operated one of the best west-side ranches and again and again showed his warm advocacy of local improvements, especially in the matter of better schools, is James Nathan Maxwell, a native of Pike County, Mo., where he was born on October 31, 1844. The father, William Maxwell, was a Virginian of a good old family, who became a pioneer in Pike County and died at the age of thirty-five. The mother was Polly Van Noy before her marriage, and she came from Tennessee. After the death of Mr. Maxwell, she married Benjamin Woodson. When she passed away, in Missouri, she was the mother of two children, by the first union and one child living of the second union. The oldest, Albert P. Maxwell, resides at Yamhill, Ore. William G. Woodson is a farmer of Borden, Madera County.

Thus orphaned, James Maxwell, the younger of the two children by his mother's first marriage, was brought up with an uncle, Edley Maxwell, a farmer, and attended the local school. In the beginning he worked on his uncle's farm, but at fifteen he began to work on the farms of other ranchers. Early and late, he was at his post of duty, and in time made such a reputation for intelligent, progressive enterprise, and for reliability and honesty, that he had no difficulty in finding engagements and opportunity.

While he was near Bowling Green, in Pike County, Mo., in 1873. Mr. Maxwell was married to Miss Mary E. Rutherford, a native of that section

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and the daughter of James Rutherford, who came from an old Kentucky family. Her father arrived in Missouri as a young man, went through the pioneer stages, and married Margaret A. Van Noy, who was born in Ten- nessee. Later he came to Fresno County with his family, and at Lone Star he and his wife breathed their last. They were the parents of fourteen chil- dren, twelve of whom grew to maturity ; and among them Mrs. Maxwell was the oldest.

After their marriage, Mr. Maxwell bought a farm ten miles from Bowl- ing Green, where he engaged in grain and stock-raising ; but on account of his ill-health, he sought a change of climate, and in 1876 sold out and located in California. For a while he had a ranchita in Los Angeles County, where he raised corn ; and succeeding, he bought a ranch of thirty acres. In 1884 he sold out and came to Fresno County and rented farm lands at Red Banks. In 1886 he homesteaded 160 acres forty-one miles west of Fresno, and there he carried on general farming. He dug a well, but the water being unfit for use, he was forced to haul water all the way from Firebaugh, twelve miles away, and at the end of seven years sold what he had for $250. During this time, he worked out in grain fields and on farms with a six-horse team. On account of the dry years he finally gave up farming there, and moved to Big Sandy, where he followed stock-raising for a period of three years. Then he rented some alfalfa land near Fresno, and so got started. In 1898, he bought twenty acres in the National Colony, paying one hundred dollars down on the place, which cost sixty-five dollars an acre. The next year he set out a fine vineyard, and grew watermelons between the rows of vines, and thus in time managed to pay for the place. Some of the melons weighed sixty pounds. He grew wine grapes, Thompson's Seedless, Sultanas and Zin- fandels ; and nowhere for miles around could finer fruit from a vineyard be seen. He early identified himself with the California Associated Raisin Company.

Four children have blessed the union of Mr. and Mrs. Maxwell. William Elmer is ranching in this county; James Guilford also has a fine farm near here; and Myrtie Ellen and Ernest Edwin dwell at home with their parents, the latter having charge of the home place. The family attend the First Christian Church of Fresno. Wide-awake to every movement for the public good, Mr. Maxwell has found pleasure in serving as a trustee of the West Side school ; that is, the school in the Penocha district. The schoolhouse used to be far below the standard; but Mr. Maxwell succeeded in bonding the district and having a new school building erected at a cost of $2.400.

ALBERT GRANT GIBBS .- A very successful and enterprising rancher and vineyardist, in the Lone Star District of Fresno County, a self-made man who has risen, by indomitable energy and judicious management, from very modest circumstances to one of comfort and is now regarded as a well- to-do viticulturist and owner of one of the best forty-acre ranches in this district is Mr. A. G. Gibbs, the subject of this sketch. He is a native of Illinois, having first seen the light of day in Adams County, November 17, 1868. Jonathan Gibbs, his father is still living at the age of eighty and is the owner of a fifty-acre vineyard at Lone Star. His mother, who in maiden- hood was Miss Elizabeth McGibbons, passed away ten years ago at Lone Star, Fresno County. Mr. and Mrs. Jonathan Gibbs were the parents of nine children, the subject of this review, A. G. Gibbs, being the third in order of birth.

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History of Fresno County, California, with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the county who have been identified with its growth and development from the early days to the present, Volume I, Part 134

Author: Vandor, Paul E., 1858- Publication date: 1919 Publisher: Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company Number of Pages: 1362

Author: Vandor, Paul E., 1858-
Publication date: 1919
Publisher: Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company
Number of Pages: 1362