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 35

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 35

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No solemn dirge or funeral hymn or chant timed his obsequies but his favorite popular airs marked the last rites over his remains. In the services at Elks' hall as the public was taking a last look at his familiar features, Theodore Reitz's orchestra played "La Paloma." A brass band of twenty pieces headed a parade of the business district by the cortege and entering the cemetery struck up for a march Sousa's "The Stars and Stripes For- ever." Following out the dead man's instructions, cortege moved through the streets at brisk walk and to the cemetery the vehicles traveled at smart speed. Passing the Grand Central Hotel, with which the name of the decedent was so long identified, the band played "Auld Lang Syne."

The funeral service was conducted in the Elks' lodge room, the same in which December 31, 1907, many feasted as guests on the golden anniver- sary of his wedding. Lodge room was not funereally draped but elaborately decorated along the same general lines as at the wedding celebration. The walls were covered with palm and green branches surmounted by a frieze of magnolias. There was no suggestion of the solemn, or of the dead. The first music played was Mendelssohn's "Spring Song" and to its soft strains the family party entered. The music was according to the dead man's wishes. "Just Some One" was one favorite and "Home Sweet Home" was another. The Elks conducted their ritualistic work and the principal address was delivered by an old friend, M. F. Tarpey, who said truly of the departed :

"No place could be cheerless where his voice resounded; no heart sor- rowful in the presence of his contagious good nature. He was a specific entity ; in everything exceptional : in nothing commonplace. Self reliant and courageous in character, he met fate's rebuffs with undaunted composure ; the threats of either adverse fortune or physical decline were powerless to stay the flow of his sunny epigrams, or cloud his intellect to the mirth of a witty sally. He loved his jest to the last; the weary, the despondent, the heartsore took new courage from the example of his untiring energy, one of his strong characteristics; his wise and quaint counsels silenced com- plaint with a quip, dispelled despondency with an epigram; hope and good will gushed spontaneously from him in a stream, carrying away care, sor- row, despondency and these could find no permanent lodgment in his aura."

At the grave and still carrying out the expressed wish to have nothing suggestive of cold formality or elaborate ritual at the funeral, Frank H. Short made a few simple remarks such as he believed the dead man and friend of many years would wish him to utter. Two thoughts are worth the preserving :

"It was more than a quarter of a century ago that Mr. Berry came here and he was then fifty-two years old. Most men at that period would have sought a place to rest in, but Mr. Berry never wanted to rest. He was a young man as long as he lived. He never succumbed to any misfortune or to any foe, until he surrendered to that to which we all must sooner or later surrender.

"You know Mr. Berry always had a horror of being considered a Chris- tian. He did not want to be considered a 'good' man. Yet his life through- out was one of helpfulness. When we remember how he used to assist, and call on to assist in the work of the Salvation Army and other worthy char- ities, we may feel safe in saying that if every person to whom he had done a kindness in this world should cast a flower on his grave, there would be even more flowers than are here today, although there never were so many flowers at a funeral here before."

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The grave was banked up with flowers and an impressive token was a wreath presented by Mr. Berry to his daughter, Mrs. Maude Lillian Fisher- Moulan, known on the comic opera stage as Maude Lillian Berri, the night before his death when she received an ovation at the Barton theater on her appearance after a long professional absence. The wreath bore the welcome "To Our Lillian." The pall-bearers were: Frank H. Short, M. F. Tarpey, D. S. Ewing, Clarence J. Berry, the Klondiker, Jack McClurg ( since de- ceased), Emanuel Katz, W. H. Harris and George M. Osborne (the actor since deceased) in place of Alexander Goldstein who could not attend be- cause of illness.

This remarkable funeral was in accord with the expressed directions of the will of August 25, 1909, which after the request that the Elks' ritual service be used at the funeral stated :

"That instead of the ordinary funeral sermon customarily used on these occasions, I feel that it would be pleasant to me to have one of my friends. Frank H. Short, or M. F. Tarpey, or in their absence or inability to act on such occasion, then D. S. Ewing, deliver on that occasion just such an address, oration or eulogy as they may think proper and fitting under the circumstances, feeling that they have been in closer touch with the emotions of my life than others could have been; I also feel that I would be pleased to know that on this occasion that I was surrounded by a profusion of flowers, and that appropriate vocal music was a predominant part of said ceremony."

Another bequest of the will was in the following provision :

"8-Recognizing the faithfulness with which my old Chinaman, George, has served me for the past sixteen (16) years at the ranch, I hereby direct and instruct my executors to purchase for him in the event he should ever desire to return to China, all necessary transportation, of such class that George may return to his native land in equally as good if not better style than he reached the shores of America."

There was expression of the pleasure to know that his casket should be borne to its last resting place by the hands of dear friends, naming those that in fact with one exception did act as the pall bearers. This testament was a unique document in Fresno County records. The estate was valued in excess of $100,000 but incumbered.

To jest was Fulton G. Berry's ruling passion. Countless are the jests and pranks ascribed to him. One historical and extravagant one to recall was on the occasion of the fiftieth jubilee celebration in San Francisco by the Native Sons of the Golden West of the admission of California into the Union. The resuscitated parlor of Fresno made its initial parade in the celebration and Berry headed the Fresno section as marshal mounted on a fine horse and picturesquely attired in costume of Spanish-Californian don in white with red silk waist sash and wearing umbrageous sombrero imported from Mexico as were the sombreros worn by the parlor members. Parade over, Berry created the sensation of the day in San Francisco in riding that mettlesome animal into the famous marble-tiled bar room of the Lick House on Montgomery Street. Only an ebullient spirit such as Berry's could have conceived such a piece of theatricalism. It was with just such pranks that he kept before the state Fresno's name and fame.

On another recalled hilarious gala occasion during the memorable boom era, when every corner and nook in the Grand Central as was the custom was monopolized by gaming tables and the play was high, Salvation Army lassies entered to make their collection. Berry seized the tambourine, flung into it a five-dollar piece and requiring every man in the bar to do likewise, cajoled every table keeper and card player to contribute from five dollars to one according to the size of the pile of chips or money before him, turned in a record collection to the lassies with an invitation to step up to the bar to drink at his expense and no offense if the invitation were declined. The

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Salvation Army never had a better friend nor more ardent champion than in Fulton G. Berry.

The vital energy of the man was extraordinary. He was like a pent up volcano. An eruption in an extravagant exploit as the one related was necessary to maintain his spiritual equipoise. He was an enthusiastic yachts- man, born in Maine amidst marine surroundings. On a visit back home in the spring of 1908, he must indulge himself in his passion for the sea by assuming command of the oldest two-masted schooner in the United States, if not in the world, and in actual service at the time-the Polly, whose his- tory antedated the War of 1812 when she traded between Boston and Penob- scot Bay, was a privateer in that war, also during the Civil War. He sailed her from Belfast to Castine, Maine, and was proud of the honor.

Not many bore a more active part than he after coming to Fresno in 1884, just before the memorable "boom times," in aiding and encouraging the work of developing the city at a time when it had a population of scarce 2,500, yet soon to seethe with the excitement of the times. Enterprise and energy were characteristic of him. He became associated with the leading improvements and industries. He was one of the most enthusiastic in per- ceiving the future possibilities with irrigation. He started the first steam laundry, aided in building the first street railway with imported discarded "bob tailed street cars" from San Francisco, was the principal owner of the gas works until the plant was sold. one of the original owners of the electric light plant, was one of the leading spirits to bring to Fresno the first steam fire engine afterward taken over by the volunteer city depart- ment : and with Ryland Wallace set out the first orange grove in the San Joaquin Valley, seventy acres of trees at Orangedale on the Kings River, promoted the first chamber of commerce, the first county citrus fair which proved a revelation, the county fairs of a week with their horse racing, open gambling and all the revels in their wake with money spent like water; it was a time when they were grading the streets and making a beginning on paving them ; when Fresno was emerging into a wild and speculation reck- less town out of the village chrysalis into the glare of the lime light and was the talk of the state.

Fulton G. Berry's death April 9. 1910, was from paralysis of the heart. He was always a liberal supporter of all sports. One of his last acts was to write a letter to James J. Jeffries, of whom he was a great admirer, accom- panying the box of raisins sent the pugilist by the Raisin Day Festival Com- mittee as an attraction on the day. By the members of the United Commer- cial Travelers, who made his Grand Central and Fulton Hotels headquarters, he was hailed as a genial soul and as "the traveling man's friend." The title of Commodore attached to him because of his yachting activities in the San Francisco days and as one time commodore of the Corinthian Yacht Club and ownership of the fast little yacht "Nixie" which outsailed everything on the bay.

He was identified with business and financial interests in San Francisco before coming to pastures new in Fresno. He was a state character, his name known from one end of it to the other. He missed being a Californian of the '49 period, still came during the height of the mining period and gold excitement. He arose from comparative poverty to affluence and influence. Vicissitudes also fell to his lot and when he came to Fresno he was a ruined man financially, Fresno County never had a more consistent booster than in him. Here he retrieved his fortune and he ever was grateful. Visiting his home after an absence of fifty-three years and noting how people econo- mized to exist, he returned declaring that should any reverses overtake him he would never leave the county to start life elsewhere.

Born in Belfast, Me., February 10, 1832, of Scotch ancestry of Massachu- setts colonial times, he was the youngest of a family of twelve. At seventeen after the discovery of gold in California, like so many thousands of others

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he concluded to try fortune in the mining fields. From New York he sailed by way of the Isthmus of Panama and after a tedious voyage arrived at San Francisco May 20, 1851. He mined in the old diggings at Forbestown and on return to the bay sent to his mother some of his first accumulations. Subsequently he mined on the American River, and on the Yuba, also at Cherokee. Locating in San Francisco in 1853, he shoveled sand and placing his earnings in a horse and dray teamed for seven years, cooking his meals and sleeping in the stable loft.

Another six years was spent in the grocery business at Jackson and Stockton Streets. During the stirring times of those early years he was an active member of the historical Vigilance Committee of 1856. He grew up with San Francisco, lived its strenuous life through until the end of the mining stock speculation craze. In the later years he was in the real estate business, associated with Alexander Badlam who was so long assessor of San Francisco, and at the height of his financial career was a member of the San Francisco Stock Exchange and paid for a seat the record breaking price of $30.000. He was a charter member of the Pacific Board-the little board as it was called-but sold the seat for the other. Later in San Rafael he leased the Tamalpais Hotel for two years and for three years thereafter served as commissary at San Quentin prison, then coming to Fresno.

Friends who had known him in his days of affluence financed him and he bought a half interest in the Grand Central Hotel here, was successful, bought out his partners in 1888 and made house the best known and most popular caravansary in the valley. He came in advance of the boom times, $16,000 in debt, and accumulated in time some of the best paying property in the county and notably the 140-acre Grand Central Farm located about three-quarters of a mile on the celebrated Kearney Boulevard, devoted to general farming and dairying, besides valuable city holdings and blocks of what was afterwards platted as Arlington Heights.

He was one of the executive committee of the Midwinter fair held in San Francisco with great success; was a Republican in politics and always prominent at conventions; served one term locally as city councilman ; was in many fraternal orders and held membership in San Francisco and Fresno clubs.

He early discerned the great possibilities of Fresno and lent his aid and encouragement in the promotion of public utility enterprises. He was public spirited as a citizen and assisted materially to advance the industrial, commercial and social interests of the city. He was one of the most loyal champions that Fresno ever had and earned for himself a permanent place in the historical literature of the county.

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CHAPTER XLIII

FIRST OF THE OPTIMISTIC LAND PROMOTERS AND COMMERCIALIZERS WAS THOMAS E. HUGHES. HIS METEORIC ACTIVITIES FASTENED ON HIM THE APPELLATION OF "FATHER OF FRESNO." LOUIS EINSTEIN WAS A PIERSTONE IN THE SUBSTANTIAL FOUNDATION OF THE CONSERVATIVE COMMERCIAL AND FINANCIAL LIFE OF THE CITY. RECOGNIZED ALSO AS A FACTOR IN THE SOCIAL AND CIVIC UPLIFT OF THE GROWING COMMUNITY. PIONEER MERCHANT AND FIRST BANKER WAS OTTO FROELICH.

First great promoter with no more substantial backing than optimism was Thomas E. Hughes. He gave evidence in his prime of such speculative energy and activity that his name has been appreciatively handed down in local annals as "The Father of Fresno."

He was born in North Carolina June 6, 1830, and was possessed of a character that made it possible for him to become an agency in shaping and advancing the destiny of the undeveloped community that he found on arrival here in June, 1878. With him speculation was a ruling passion.

Nature had fitted him to be a boomer and promoter and in Fresno he found a virgin field for the exercise of his extraordinary capabilities in this line. His stock in trade was optimism. Financial means to launch his first enterprises he had little or none. In the zenith of his career he was accounted one of the rich men of the county. Fortune favored him several times but with the fickleness of that goddess his experience has been that of others before him to be deserted in the end. Financial reverses, and in his career the experience became a familiar one, left him undaunted.

After several years of ill health and failing mentality due to advanced age, the pioneer builder of Fresno City died at the home of his daughter, Mrs. W. D. Foote, near Los Angeles, April 19, 1919, and his remains were sent to Fresno to be buried. His first love for Fresno was so deeply im- planted in his heart that although his home had been for upwards of a dec- ade in the southern city a promise had been exacted from his eldest liv- ing son that wherever he might die he should be laid away amidst the scenes of his greatest activities and lasting accomplishments. That wish was re- spected and the funeral was under the auspices of the Masons, with which fraternity he had affiliated before his coming to California. At the time of death he lacked one month of the age of eighty-nine years.

Much could be written of his remarkable active life, the city develop- ment and farm colonization work that he pioneered in Fresno. His op- timism was boundless. His experience was that of many others in reverses of fortune as the result of the panic times of 1893, and while he had to abandon many of his interests here and was left financially embarrassed he did not lose heart but retained the courage to make still another be- ginning, far advanced in life though he was. After leaving Fresno, which for a period of more than ten years he visited only at intervals and on an- niversary occasions or family reunions, he undertook lastly an agricultural land development enterprise under a Mexican grant.

Conditions did not please him, especially not the high-handed methods of the landed proprietorship in the promotion of labor peonage. He had also turned his attention to mining development and was believed to have been on the road to success when the Madero revolution of 1909 broke out, and he returned home to await the time when there would be more settled business conditions. He had always hoped to return and take advantage

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of the possibilities that he said awaited him there. The hope was vain. He had not reckoned on his advanced age and his health. In his last years he em- braced the Christian Science faith.

At the funeral the pallbearers were Masons and old-time friends. The general public was not in attendance as mourners at the funeral of one who had done so much for the city that he was known as "The Father of Fresno," whose name and deeds were in the mouth of every one. Such a change in the population had come about during the years of his absence from the city that he builded that it was only another generation that could recall him from a personal knowledge and association, so rapid and great had been the changes. The flags were raised at half mast from the city public build- ings on the day of the funeral.

Surviving him are the daughter, Mrs. W. D. Foote, of Los Angeles, and three grandchildren ; the sons James E. Hughes of Fresno and William M. Hughes of Madera and Arizona, and their grandsons Edwin E. Hughes the Fresno postmaster, and Kenneth L. Hughes of Tranquillity, and the great grandchildren. The son, James E. Hughes, desired at the funeral of his father to chose for pallbearers the intimate friends who were chosen companions of him on a memorable excursion in July, 1892. He was unable to find a sufficient number, so great had been the changes between the day of Thomas E. Hughes' departure from Fresno and that of his death. In grateful acknowledgment of many uniform courtesies shown him by Mr. Hughes and other prominent citizens on his visits to Fresno, A. N. Towne, general manager of the Southern Pacific, tendered the use of the private car "Carmello" for a visit to the Sacramento River Canyon to the then newly opened Castle Crag Tavern, to Sissons at the base of Mount Shasta and over the Siskiyou Mountains, the visit in fact not ending until Portland Ore., was reached.

The car was at disposal on Thursday, July 14, and, according to the directions "there will be no charge for the use of the car, the servants or the passage money ; the only expense you would be to would be for pro- visioning the car to suit your own taste." The party returned by way of San Francisco and visited Stanford University before coming home. Mr. Hughes invited the following named to accompany him and wife: Mr. and Mrs. Fulton G. Berry, Miss Maude Berry, Mr. and Mrs. M. K. Harris, Mr. and Mrs. H. D. Colson, Mr. and Mrs. F. K. Prescott, Mr. and Mrs. L. L. Cory, Mr. and Mrs. W. H. Mckenzie, Mr. and Mrs. O. J. Woodward, Mr. and Mrs. T. C. White, Mr. and Mrs. Louis Einstein, Dr. and Mrs. Lewis Leach, Miss Imogene Rowell and Mr. and Mrs. J. R. White. Of the gentle- men of the party the living on the day of the funeral of their one-time host were Messrs. M. K. Harris, T. K. Prescott, O. J. Woodward, T. C. White and L. L. Cory.

Thomas E. Hughes was a man of dynamic force of character. He was a bold and successful operator in enterprises in which his neighbors would not dare. He made many successes; he had failures and yet it seemed to onlookers that he had in his grasp the wand of magic and that whatever he touched turned to gold. It was said of him that within five years after settling in Fresno he was paying out as interest $18,750 a year on $150.000 that he had borrowed from banks and individuals to float his projects. With his early career in Batesville, Ark., this history is not concerned. It has to deal with him in California as connected with Fresno and the development with which he had so much to do. Thomas E. Hughes married Miss Mary J. Rogers, daughter of a clergyman, December 18, 1850, at Batesville and in the spring of 1853 he sold his business and on the overland journey to Cali- fornia was accompanied by a brother-in-law, William R. Feemster, sister and youngest brother, traveling up the Kansas River. He became a Mason before departure. The cattle drivers working their way across, deserted in the sink of the Humboldt, believing they could travel faster and become

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rich before the arrival of the main party in California. The women rode in a wagon to which a yoke of four cattle was attached, drove the yoke or fol- lowed the Feemster leading wagon. Hughes and brother, John, drove cattle for four days, and then hiring help on the journey met between the Hum- boldt and the Carson River the oldest brother, William C., who had come from California to intercept them with fresh teams and provisions.

He had bought an additional band of cattle and the party crossed the Sierra at the old Carson River road and arrived eight miles north of Stock- ton, October 5, 1853, with two wagons and 200 cattle. William lived at Murphy's Camp. Here the brother-in-law also settled and here, March 28, 1854, Thomas E.'s first son was born. It was to be Hughes' first experience in farming. He traded for a squatter's claim to 160 acres, in the winter of 1853 bought seed wheat at three and barley at two and a half cents and with a twenty-four inch plow and four yoke of cattle plowed and seeded 100 acres of grain. Wheat crop turned to smut and the barley harvesting cost him more than he could sell it for after sacking. Discouraged, he de- cided to rent land claimed by three neighbors and take stock to ranch. He solicited the horses and cattle of others and in less than thirty days the story is that he had stock enough to give him an income of $800 a month and he was soon on his feet.

The second son, James E., was born December 26, 1855. The relatives of Mrs. Hughes had for a year importuned her to return to Arkansas. Stock- ton was left in March, 1856, for San Francisco, for a steamship return to New Orleans and by land on to Batesville. There, after brief stay, the wife was taken ill and the decision was made to return to California in the spring of 1857. The Californians were prevailed upon to delay departure that her father might close his affairs to accompany them westward, and the third son, William M., was born February 15, 1858. The actual departure was on April 1, 1859, with five emigrant wagons, a carriage and 400 head of cattle, owning at start only a small part of the outfit. Mrs. Hughes suffered from lung trouble, had to be conveyed in the carriage and was im- proving during the first month of the journey, but an unfortunate accident took place. The carriage was about to cross a small stream, a dog jumped in front of the horses causing them to turn to one side, the vehicle was upset. Mrs. Hughes was thrown into the water, took a bad cold, began to sink fast and on the morning of the arrival at Fort Laramie breathed her last. The remains were preserved in charcoal and conveyed to Stock- ton for burial after arrival late in September.

The stock was kept during the winter of 1859 some twenty miles north- east of Stockton. In the spring of 1860 Mr. Hughes bought 240 acres in what was known as Bachelors' Valley, commanding the waters of a small creek. The father-in-law having left unsettled business in Arkansas and Tennessee prevailed on the son-in-law to return East and Thomas E. left San Francisco, December, 1860, for New York on the steamer "Sonora." He returned to Stockton bringing the trotting stallion known as "Washtinaw Chief" and as "Niagara" after sale by him for $5,000. There was loss of cattle during the dry season of 1862, and in the notable wet season of 1864 he sold what he had left for five dollars to ten dollars a head and turned his attention again to farming. He had only 240 acres, which was deemed insufficient. A friend had just sold a copper mine. He had cash and from him Hughes borrowed $4,000 to enter upon more land. He paid two per cent. interest per month, payable monthly or to be added to principal, mortgaging the 240 acres and also the 3,000 acquired by entering soldier warrants bought for fifty cents on the dollar. Here were then 3,240 acres but no money to farm them. Crop was mortgaged at the same usurious rate and the next summer the crop paid the debt with something left over.

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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 35

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