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 71

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 71

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The Kutner, Goldstein & Co. store building was destroyed by fire in August, 1918. It was a landmark and was referred to as their "new store," when construction of it was begun in May, 1878, as one of the first two-story, brick structures in the infant village.

Twenty years ago the Fresno city trustees unanimously passed the "high hat" ordinance against the wearing in theaters by women of view obstruct- ing hats. There was objection that it was discriminating legislation because drawing distinction between theater and church. No one ever contested the ordinance and it is on the books to this day. Trustee Spinney was the ob- jector but voted for the ordinance.

Blissful days of forty years ago! C. M. Jones & Sons at their Fresno Flouring Mills located within 100 feet of the present business center of town ground grain on Mondays and Saturdays for patrons. They announced that they had ground feed always on hand and fine corn meal for sale at reason- able rates. This was the year when Ross, the father of Charles, was moving heaven and earth for aid in the search for his stolen, lost or strayed boy and the nation was moved with sympathy for him.

It was in January, 1898, that the Sisters of the Holy Cross conducting St. Augustine's Academy purchased the W. M. Williams residence property at R and Mariposa Streets with two lots adjoining to establish the school there, the quarters adjoining the Catholic parochial church on M Street back of the courthouse square being too small for the growing institution. The seller took in trade seven lots on N Street next to the flour mill, purchased the summer before when the old high school building was moved there but fire destroyed the site buildings with heavy loss to the sisters.

Accept the figures for what they are worth. The publishers of the Fresno city directory for 1918 give the city a population of 52,374, exclusive of the Orientals, but adding them, estimate that the 60,000 mark has been reached. The city section of the directory contained 19,589 names, or 1,264 more than the one for 1917. As the names of married women and girls living at home and having no occupation are eliminated, the multiple of two and two-thirds has been used to give an estimated population of city and environs as stated, an increase of 4,607 over the year before.

Up to the middle of the month of August, 1898, the city's most disastrous fire was the one starting at midnight that swept the space on the west side of the railroad reservation from Mariposa to Mono for about four blocks

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HISTORY OF FRESNO COUNTY

and made a clean sweep of it in part or entire destruction of the warehouses and packing houses, besides the home of Yardmaster John Doyle and about twenty freight cars and several sleepers. The conservative aggregate loss was nearly half a million.

Fresno City's registration for the August, 1918, primary election was a total of 14,735 with Republicans numbering 6,372 and Democrats 6,027.

Fresno City has a woman policeman by brevet. She is Mrs. A. L. Ras- mussen. She is rated as such following appointment in August, 1918, as clerk of the police department. She sought the post because her husband was sub- ject to the military draft.

The assessment valuation of the city for 1918-19 is $25,603,436. making with the eight other incorporated towns in the county, a total of $31,215,626. The city has four district tax rates.

"Intelligence and Fashion Attend the Consecration" was one newspaper sub-head in the "scare head" to the article describing the opening night of the Barton opera house on Monday, September 29, 1890. It was, to be sure, a notable gathering and the Expositor as usual had to take up its ancient song with the threadbare chorus that "nothing occurred to interfere with the happiness or pleasure of the audience." George E. Church delivered the congratulatory address in eulogism of Robert Barton. Henry E. Dixcy in the burlesque "Adonis" was the theatrical attraction and to read the next day's account la jeunesse dorée of Fresno went wild over the female chorus. After the curtain went down, Robert Barton was called for and in turn delivered himself of a speech. The following false prophecy is recalled because it had been preserved in cold type. It was this: "This city will have 75,000 inhabit- ants inside of ten years and in less than five years from now-just think, less than five years-we will be close on the heels of our sister city. Los Angeles, in population and most of you know how many theaters she has." This was after the big boom and prophecy was one of the echoes of it. It may be added that the erection of the theater was an after thought. Robert Barton bought half of the half block with frontages on J and Fresno Streets and the alley as a venture purely, intending to hold the idle terrain as an investment. He was induced to erect the corner building with basement, street floor as stores and the upper as a hall for military drills and for public assemblies, with the appurtenant rooms as headquarters for the then two national guard mil- itary companies, hence the name Armory Hall. As the plan progressed, the scheme enlarged and decadence of the Armory Hall theater and his own abiding faith in the future of Fresno led to the construction of the adjoin- ing theater structure, the whole representing an investment of $100,000.

It was at the close of the month of November, 1878-again forty years ago-that a geographical survey party in charge of Lieut. H. H. Ludlow, Second United States Artillery, appeared in Fresno to undertake extensive topographical work in this part of the state, establish base or starting point in Fresno from which to proceed to the mountains, erect monuments upon prominent points for the further prosecution of the work in the higher regions, also place bench marks of altitudes and levels in a thorough mapping of the county with base line for the continuance of the survey to Los Angeles to tie in on. The survey was part of the geographical platting authorized by Congress. It is no violent stretch of the imagination to suppose that this was the party that erected the local monument that Fresno has accepted as marking the geographical center of the state.

It was about September 15, 1918, that the Fresno Traction Company under authorization of the state railroad commission began to charge a six cent fare on its city street car system and increased its commutation rates ten per cent. The increase from the long established five cent rate was au- thorized also in other cities. The cost of everything connected with street car construction and operation had gone up and the competition of automo- biles had decreased the revenue. It only required this with the war taxes

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to usher in the day of the copper penny in California, and there was nothing to do but to carry a vest pocketful of coppers to make exact change, and put up with this bother rather than a ten cent fare. A day was when paper money and coppers were curiosities in California. Times have changed!

The big fire that destroyed the pioneer establishment of Kutner, Gold- stein Co. and for a time endangering also the older landmark of the Louis Ein- stein Pioneer building at the opposite Mariposa and H Street corner broke out on the night of August 9, 1918. The Kutner-Goldstein Co. two-story brick proved a total loss. The firm sent a $250 check as a contribution to the firemen's relief fund.

The first official act of Former Police Chief Edward Jones in the newly created office of city purchasing agent was on September 23, 1917, to replace by the Stars and Stripes the torn, tattered and sun-bleached "Old Glory" that flew from the city hall. There was with the war spirit general replacing about town of the tattered national emblems following the agitation by the newspapers.

August month in 1917 established a record for attendance in the Fresno City playgrounds. Grand total was 60,586 as against 39,673 for the same period the year before, since which two playgrounds had been added besides which for the 1917 season there was the city swimming pool in the use of Dry Creek with an attendance of 15,625 alone.

Fresno's then newest $200,000 city block in the Mason building occupy- ing on J Street, near Mariposa, the one time site of Jones' flour mills, was opened with the start of the elevators March 1, 1918. The property is owned in England. A few days after the opening of the block, news was received of the death of the maiden lady absentee landlord.

As a war time food conservation measure, whale meat made its first appearance in the city markets October 13, 1917 and was extensively adver- tised. It sold for ten cents a pound. Candor compels the statement that the public did not take kindly to the meat of the sea mammal.

It was forty years ago in October, 1878, that the commissioners appointed by the Roman Catholic bishop arrived to solicit subscriptions and donations towards the enterprise of building a Catholic church in Fresno. Plans and specifications were looked over, but the decision was for a brick building, 30×50, plans and specifications for which were adopted and construction con- tract awarded. The railroad company donated two lots for a site and the commissioners purchased two adjoining at the corner of M and Fresno Streets. This church stood until 1902, when it was demolished and the property sold after acquiring a more advantageously located site at the upper end of Mari- posa Street to meet the growing demands of the parish with a congregation of communicants the largest in the territory embraced in the parish and in- cluding several missionary chapels in neighboring adjoining counties. The original church site passed by purchase eventually into the possession of the Fraternal Order of Eagles.

Twenty-one years ago in 1897, twelve persons organized in Fresno the First Church of Christ Scientists. October 16, 1918 the new church building at N and Calaveras Streets was formally dedicated and as it is the policy of this denominational cult to pay in advance for church properties and not sad- dle itself with debt the dedication was not without significance. The handful of adherents in 1897 was content to meet in a public hall and few hoped for such a growth as followed. In 1903 it became urgent to seek larger quarters and the First Presbyterian Church property at 2027 Merced Street was bought. Another ten years and the capacity was taxed and the present location was bought and building operations were begun in April, 1916. Services were held in the Sabbath school room November 26 before the main structure was finished. In May, 1918, the congregation held first service gathering in the main auditorium. The building is a classical one in design.

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HISTORY OF FRESNO COUNTY

Fresno is today a city of churches, strongest evidence of the change in the moral atmosphere in contrast between forty years ago and the present. Every denomination is represented in the list of churches, with services in the English, Armenian, Danish and Swedish languages, besides the Orientals in Chinese and Japanese houses of worship. November 18, 1917, was dedicated the new Bethel Danish Lutheran Church with the presiding church official, Rev. G. B. Christiansen of Audubon, Iowa, A. R. of D., bishop of the Danish Lutherans in America and generally known as the president of the United States Evangelical Lutheran Church. The pastors of churches of Los Angeles, San Francisco and of Easton, Fresno, Selma and Reedley in this county were at the dedication.

The dedication of the Liberty Theater was an event on Tuesday, Novem- ber 7. 1917. That this theater was considered a factor in the moving picture world was evidenced by the fact that outside of the San Francisco Panama Canal Exposition in 1915 it was the first time in the history of the industry in the state that managers and leading directors of film productions dropped their engagements to be at this initial exhibition of a motion picture theater.

The new Burnett Sanitarium on S Street, south of Fresno, as one of the most modernized institutions of the kind on the coast with accommodations for 120 patients, was completed November 25, 1917. The Sanitarium had its origin twenty-one years ago in a residence on North J Street, known as "The Palms." and destroved by fire in the summer of 1917. Sanitarium was moved to S and Fresno before that and there the first unit of the original building was constructed. Additional units were made necessary and a fire with a consider- able loss made incumbent the present building and equipment representing an outlay of $150,000.

Notable business property sale of October, 1917, was that of the pioneer Wiener block on Tulare Street between I and J bought by Charles R. Puck- haber and Frederick J. Dow from Mrs. Selma S. Wiener for approximately $75.000. The block is a two-story brick structure, 75x75, and dates from the boom year with its characteristic style of architecture.

A small army of children attends the Fresno city schools. The enroll- ment for 1917 was 7,641 as against 7,047 for the year before for the twelve elementary and one high school. The increase was entirely in the elementary, the high school enrollment standing at 1,200 for the two years. The Fresno school district includes territory without the city limits but abutting.

The fall season of 1917 was a notable one in the line of construction of business blocks. New buildings totalling over $900,000 were listed in October and all were erected and completed the following twelfth month. The show- ing was a remarkable one considering the war times, the high cost of material and labor and the scarcity of skilled labor. In the list were the following, not including the new packing plant of the California Associated Raisin Company at the southern city limits and the other plants that it and the peach growers erected at various localities in the county, the great raisin and fruit plant of Rosenberg Bros., also in the new industrial district, the plant buildings of the California Products Company replacing structures de- stroyed by fire and new ones to take up the handling of cotton, the enlarge- ments of quarters by the Farmers' and Union National Banks and various other notable though lesser costing business block structures, all going to demonstrate that there was no apparent hesitancy on the part of capitalists or land owners to invest in new buildings with no shadow of a doubt as to the

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resumption of this rapid and substantial growth after removal of the govern- inent's hindrances with the cessation of the war. 1917 listings were these :

Bank of Italy $200,000

Mason Block

187,000

Frank Short for Roos Bros

146,800

Einstein Investment Company Liberty Theater

125,000

Burnett Sanitarium

90,000

Frank Short for Willys-Overland.

60,000

Louis Gundelfinger for Liberty Market

35,000

Fresno Planing Mill

25.000

Jacob Richter Building

22,000

Mrs. Pat Culleton Building

10.000

Dr. D. H. Trowbridge for Superior Motor Sales Company

10,000

Total $935,800

The Bank of Italy eight-story sky scraper is at the corner of J and Tulare : 285 tons of steel entered into the construction ; it is from an artistic standpoint the finest edifice in the city. The Mason Block is a six-story build- ing and architecturally notable. The Sanitarium addition is of five stories, reenforced concrete, with a $30.000 equipment, finished throughout with oak and with linotyling flooring in the corridors. The Liberty Market on Van Ness, near Kern, is one-story of pressed white brick and has a 100-foot frontage. The Liberty Theater on Van Ness is as fine a moving picture house as there is to be found on the coast. The Roos Bros.' building at J and Merced is two stories but the foundations are laid for an eight-story structure. The day is not far distant when the three Mariposa and J Street corners will mark the site of sky scrapers to keep the Griffith-Mckenzie pioneer at the northwest corner company. It is an open secret that the Bradley estate for the northeast corner, the Einstein Investment Company for the southeast corner and Radin & Kamp as owners of the Grand Central Hotel corner have plans drawn for sky scraper buildings and that construc- tion work might have been commenced before this writing but for the government's war inhibitions.

Forty years ago (August 10, 1878) the city school district trustees ac- cepted the bid of Frank & C. S. Peck for the school bonds authorized by the legislature and made award at ninety cents on the dollar. Contract for the erection of the building went to Shanklin & Donahoo of Fresno for $7,900 but there was error in the calculation in the estimates for plastering and as they could not correct it then and declined to accept the award or file the required bond the award followed to the Pecks of Merced for $9,195 as the next lowest bidders. The building was erected on the block of land bought for a school fronting on Fresno Street, two blocks from the court- house. The building stands yet and is used for school purposes. though it has been turned and placed on another site in the block to make room for the brick Lowell school building.

Wiped out by fire in July in the 600 block on I Street, the Fresno Planing Mill Company started machinery November 23, 1917, in its new plant at H and Monterey representing an investment of $80,000 and provided with appliances to handle 1,000,000 feet of lumber in a year. It lost half a million feet in the fire. The new plant is in a fire-proof brick building.

Along in August, 1918, various fires broke out with accompanying large losses. There were evidences warranting the strong suspicion that these burnings were incendiary as acts of sabotage by the I. W. W.'s in revenge for the arrest and indictment by the federal courts of twenty-five leaders and members for treasonable acts and utterances. On the night of August 28 the

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HISTORY OF FRESNO COUNTY

E. Schmitz Fresno City Hay Market was destroyed and the flames swept the half block at Mariposa and E, razing the market, also the Fresno Horse and Mule Market, 600 tons of hay stored in the first and burning to death four horses and three mules. The loss was over $20,000. To the same cause was ascribed the origin of the fire a few days before which destroyed the Madary Planing Mill at H and Kern, the night being a windy one and the flames working through the block enveloping and spreading havoc in the Hollenbeck-Bush mill on Inyo Street. In these and other instances the evi- dence was that the fire was set from the outside. The Madary mill rebuilt a concrete and steel mill on another site to cost approximately $200,- 000. It was the second time that the other mill had been burned out at the same site with neither fire originating in the mill but in the Madary wooden structure. After the second, a building was erected that was thought to be fire proof. The Hollenbeck-Bush corporation acquired a five-acre site on Cherry Avenue on the railroad and in the southern end of the town. This mill will cost about $100,000 and will be served by a spur-track.

January 7, 1889, work was commenced on the first Fresno sewer system. Eighteen months before $175,000 was voted at a special election in bonds, $100,000 to be spent on the sewer system and the remainder for school, fire and water purposes. Contract was awarded to a company to lay the sewer piping but after long delay it decided not to proceed with the work. Con- tract was annulled in June, 1888. New bids were called for and in Septem- ber, 1888, contract was relet and 200 men were placed on the work. The sewage farm was of 320 acres, five miles southwest of town and the sewage was conveyed from the foot of Merced Street in twenty-four-inch pipe to within half a mile from the farm and then by open ditch. Contract was also entered into with the canal company for two cubic feet of water per second for flushing the pipes. The sewer contractors obligated themselves for five years to dispose of the sewage at $4,900 annually. Thirty-nine thousand feet of pipe were laid.

Petition to change the postoffice name from Fresno City to Fresno was circulated January 16, 1889.

The city was divided politically into five wards by the town trustees February 4, 1889. Two days later was held one of the great sales of land near Fresno.

City trustees declined to repeal February 12, 1889, the ordinance for the midnight hour closing of the saloons. March 19 the ordinance was de- clared invalid.

Oscar Beaver was on February 26, 1889, found guilty of manslaughter in the killing of J. N. Cripe and two days later was sentenced to imprison- ment for one year at San Quentin. Beaver was one of the "gun men" and "man hunters" in the pursuit of the bandit gang of Sontag and Evans. There were others.

March 14, 1889, Fresno banks adopted a uniform opening and closing hour.

Simon W. Henry's livery stables at Tulare and J Streets in Fresno caught fire on the morning of June 8, 1889; six horses were burned; loss $10,000.

July 1, 1889, Fresno inaugurated free mail delivery ..

Charles Reavis murdered Deputy Sheriff J. N. Wren July 6, 1889, and next day Reavis was killed by peace officers while resisting arrest. He es- caped after the murder with a revolver in each hand.

July 12, 1889, fire partially consumed the Fiske block at Mariposa and J. August 1 Charles Hogan and Honas Ricker, bellboys of the Grand Central Hotel, were rewarded with gold watches and chains for heroic work at the fire.

The Russ House at the corner of Fresno and I, the livery stable, two

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HISTORY OF FRESNO COUNTY

adjoining residences and twenty-eight horses were burned in a fire on the morning of July 17, 1889.

December 9, 1889, A. H. Cummings was awarded judgment for $17,000 against John D. Fiske in an accounting case as to royalties on a patent car-coupler. A verbal squabble over this claim resulted in a street brawl and the fatal shooting of Fiske by Cummings.

The year 1889 was a notable one in the line of city building operations under the stimulus of the optimism that accompanied the boom. Many of the early notable business blocks were completed during this year. Many of these stand to this day. They are readily identified because of their archi- tecture of the day with the Mansard roof, bow windows and corner steeples or cupola as distinguishing features. They were substantial blocks that com- pare favorably with many of the present day constructed, showy buildings. This building era activity resulted in a wonderful improvement of the busi- ness district in departure from the wooden shacks. A partial list of the more notable completed brick and stone buildings of the year is the following: Kutner, Goldstein & Company three-story brick on west side of I be- tween Mariposa and Fresno, $50,000; Einstein business block and hall, east side of I between Tulare and Kern, two stories, $30,000; Farmers' Bank, three stories, Mariposa and I, $40,000; Donahoo, Emmons & Company, three stories adjoining the bank on I and on Mariposa, $30,000; H. C. Warner three-story on Mariposa between I and J. $15,000, also on north side of Mariposa between I and J; O. J. Meade three-story building, $19,000; Ber- nard & Monaghan two-story. $9,000; J. F. Haviland two-story, $8,300; M. Denicke two-story with vaulted basement, $14,000; W. E. Gilmour two- story, $7,000; A. F. Baker three-story at Fresno and J (afterward the Pleas- ant View and later the Helm block), $50,000; A. S. Edgerly three stories at Tulare and J. $60,000; R. B. Johnson's Temple Bar, Mariposa and K, three- story, $65,000; Olcese & Garibaldi, two stories at Mariposa and K, $18,000; G. W. Herminghaus three-story north side Mariposa between I and J. $7,500; also J. Brownstone's three-story, $8,000, and J. C. Walker's three-story, $9,000; M. E. Gonzales' Excelsior Stables east side of I between Mariposa and Tulare, two and one-half stories, $23,000; Pleasanton Hotel three stories at Merced and I, $40,000; Y. M. C. A. first unit three stories, $30,000; W. W. Phillips' two-story on J between Mariposa and Fresno, $8,000; Fresno Na- tional Bank three stories at Tulare and J, $40,000; Fresno Loan and Savings Bank four stories at Mariposa and J, $60,000; Jerry Ryan's Arlington three- story brick at J and Kern, $14,000; First National three-story bank building at Mariposa and I, $28,000; Dr. Maxon's bath house, 49x132, west side of N between Mariposa and Fresno, $8,000; City school at Santa Clara and K, $20,000; C Street school, $16,500; Southern Pacific depot, $30,000; Adven- tists' Church at Mariposa and O, the finest in the interior of the state, with schoolroom and capacity for 800, $30,000; it is 58x120, has a 3,000-pound bell and a $2,000 clock in belfry tower 104 feet high. It is the town clock since the demolition of the Fiske building to clear the site for the Griffith- Mckenzie first sky scraper whereupon the town clock was presented to the city and is preserved in the second high school building; Presbyterian Church at K and Merced, $12,000; Southern Pacific freight depot remodeled and enlarged making old passenger depot with additions 525 feet long and fifty wide; Henry Voorman had in construction a $20,000 two-story block on the west side of I between Mariposa and Tulare and was making $10,000 additions to his adjoining property on the south; M. J. Church was build- ing a 125x125, three stories Sanatorium at N and Mariposa to cost $75,000; Robert Barton his basement and first floor market and second floor Armory Hall, with theater adjoining; John D. Fiske three-story, fifty feet on Mari- posa and 150 feet windowed frontage on J, at cost of $60,000 and adjoining on J, William Helm was erecting a $25,000 three-story with basement busi- ness block. S. Williams a reported member of Parliament and of Liverpool,

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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 71

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