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 II, Part 105

Author: Vandor, Paul E., 1858-
Publication date: 1919
Publisher: Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company
Number of Pages: 1424

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 II > Part 105

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In Hollister, April 9, 1889, Mr. Akers married Nellie Hart who was born in Santa Clara County, the daughter of Patrick and Margaret (Burns) Hart, natives of Ireland, who located in Wisconsin and in 1861 came via Panama, locating at Santa Clara where Mr. Hart was a flour miller until he located at Hollister; after a few years removed to Priest Valley, Monterey County, where he was among the pioneers of the Valley; there he and his wife passed away. Mrs. Akers was the second oldest of their five children, and was reared and educated in Priest Valley. Mr. and Mrs. Akers have five children : Maggie, Mrs. Herman James of Belridge; Lottie, Irene, Herman and Charles. For many years Mr. Akers has been clerk of the Louis school district. In national politics he is a Democrat, but in local matters he prefers to vote for the man rather than party.

MR. and MRS. JOHN A. YOUNGQUIST .- The enterprising and popu- lar merchants at Auberry, Fresno County, are Mr. and Mrs. John A. Youngquist, who have a splendid location and a large trade. John Young- quist was born in Evanston, Ill., August 31, 1886, the son of S. W. and Hannah Youngquist. His father was a shoe merchant in Chicago, being in business there at the time of the Chicago fire in 1871. He established his residence in Evanston where he also established a grocery business in which he became successful. After many years of strenuous life he and his wife now live retired in the enjoyment of peace and comfort-the fruits of their early labors.

John A. received his education in the public and high schools of Evanston as-well-as the Northwestern University, after which he entered the employ of the C. B. & Q. R. R. in the purchasing and store department, afterwards holding a similar position with the C. & R. I. R. R., and still later with the Santa Fe. He gained much valuable knowledge and experience and became a very efficient and valued employe.

Coming to Los Angeles in 1907, Mr. Youngquist entered the employ of the Pacific Electric, organized their store department and continued with them as storekeeper for two years. Next he went with the Santa Fe and handled the supply train between San Francisco and El Paso. Afterwards he went into the new offices of the Southern Pacific where he had charge of a branch of revaluation work, compiling it for the Southern Pacific Railroad Company at the request of the United States Government. After this he en- gaged with the San Joaquin and Eastern Railroad. Coming to Auberry in the spring of 1917, he organized the store department for them and, com- pleting the work of organization, he resigned his position to engage in the merchandise business on his own account.

On June 17, 1918, he married Mrs. Lillian (McFaul) Witham, who was born in Brighton, Ontario, and came to California with her parents, Daniel

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and Carrie McFaul who located in Madera County, where Mr. McFaul was in the employ of the Flume and Trading Company until he retired. Her parents are now both deceased. Lillian McFaul received a good education in the schools of Madera. In Fresno, March, 1901, she married Frank Witham, a prominent merchant of Fresno. He was a native of Lowell, Mass., of an old Eastern family, and a well-educated and cultured man. He came out to California when eighteen years of age and was engaged in the grocery business in Fresno for thirty-two years. In 1904 Mr. and Mrs. Witham located in Auberry and engaged in the general merchandise business. Mr. Witham was appointed postmaster at Auberry and filled the position accept- ably. He passed to the great beyond on December 17, 1917, aged fifty-one years. Mrs. Youngquist has a very fine and valuable collection of Indian baskets, beads and curios, which she prizes very highly. The Youngquists have a very complete stock of merchandise for a country store and have a large patronage. Their little ranch at Auberry is a trim, well-kept place, with a comfortable bungalow residence.

In 1918 Mr. Youngquist became a member of the Spruce Production Division of the United States Army, serving at Yaquima Bay as acting supply and property sergeant until he was honorably discharged January 29, 1919, after six months' service. During his absence in the service of his country Mrs. Youngquist ran the store. Mr. and Mrs. Youngquist are well-liked and popular, both are protectionists and are Republicans in politics.

MRS. LUCINDA HOUSER .- A woman highly esteemed for her noble qualities who is one of the oldest settlers of Watts Valley, Fresno County, is Mrs. Lucinda Houser whose maiden name was Lucinda Hole, born in Darke County, Ohio, April 18, 1843. Her father, Wm. Hole was also a native of Darke County of an old Virginian family; he married Elizabeth Blotner who was born in Pennsylvania. They engaged in farming in Darke County, Ohio, afterwards removing to Mercer County, Ohio, again following husbandry until 1874, when they came to the Pacific Coast in 1877, and were pioneers of Watts Valley where they improved a homestead on which they resided until their death, the mother passing away at the age of 68, while the father died in 1902 aged eighty-six years. Of their thirteen children, eight grew up and came to Fresno County but only four girls are now living of whom, Lucinda is the old- est. Reared on the farm in the Buckeye State she received a good education in the public schools. She was married in Mercer County, June 16, 1864, to John N. Houser who was born in Fairfield County, Ohio, in 1838. He served in Company F, Fifty-sixth Ohio Infantry, in the Civil War and after a year's service was honorably discharged. In the fall of 1864 the young couple removed to Iowa and farmed in Fremont County until 1875, when they concluded to come to the Coast. After a short stay at Chico, Cal., they removed to Oregon but in 1877 returned to California and were among the first settlers of Watts Valley. Here they located a squatter's claim, built a small log house and began improvements and four or five years afterwards when the land was surveyed they filed their homestead and soon obtained title to the land and afterwards bought land adjoining and now have 520 acres lying just next to the National Forest Reserve so with the permit they have a valuable range the year around. Mr. Houser died January 23, 1900. He was a member of the Odd Fellows. Since his death his widow resides on the old home. The ranch and cattle being now cared for by her two sons Louis J., and James A., who have grown up on the ranch. Mr. and Mrs. Houser had eight children : Heppy Ann, Mrs. Trively of Fresno; Edna Arminda, Mrs. Williams of Garfield district, Fresno County ; Josiah died at twenty-six years ; Louis Jackson, on the home ranch ; Clara May, Mrs. Wag- goner of Los Banos; James A., married Sarah C. Brasch also residing on the home ranch; Emarintha, the wife of Arthur Highman, died in Salinas ; Ander- son died at twenty-two. The three last named were born in California. Mrs. Houser is a devout Christian and a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church.

AMilliams

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SAMUEL B. WILLIAMS .- A prominent man in both religious and political councils, as much of a giant intellectually and morally as he is physically-for he stands six feet two inches high, and weighs 215 pounds, a superb specimen of real manhood-is Samuel B. Williams, once widely known as deputy sheriff, and now very successful as a rancher, road super- visor and director-at-large of the Fresno County Farm Bureau. He was born in Bedford County, Tenn., seven miles northwest of Shelbyville, and his earliest recollections revert to Fall Creek, where as a boy he enjoyed with his father his favorite pastime of fishing. In Bedford County he first saw the light on August 25, 1872, and growing up in the Volunteer State, he mi- grated to California alone, bidding adieu, in his twentieth year, to father and home, on July 28, 1892.

He was practically only a boy when he left the parental roof, with his through railway fare, a present from his father, and five dollars sewed into a coonskin bag secured around his body. The blessings of his mother, and two quilts worked by her, also accompanied him. Thus equipped, he stepped upon the stage of life's actual work at Tipton, Cal., where he arrived on August 3, 1892. He worked for forty-two days there, and then he left tor Fresno City.

At Fresno he entered the employ of old Dr. W. J. Prather, and ran the vard and stables of the vineyard for six months. The job was hard, long and exacting, and the pay was exceptionally small, and what he received was given him on worse than the installment plan. He took it out, in fact, in dentistry and an old shot-gun; for he received no money for all that he had done. It is needless to say that it was only a matter of time and he left the old doctor's employ.

On March 2, 1893, he came over to the West Side and entered the employ of William Wilkinson, with whom he remained for six months; and there he learned to drive the harvester. Finishing Wilkinson's harvest, on September 3, he went to Olney Whiteside's ranch and worked for him until after the harvest in 1895. He then began to work for Samuel B. Williams, and he never expects to be employed again for anybody else. He "bached" for four years, prepared and ate his own cooking, and still survived. On November 9, 1899, however, he was married to Miss Lena E. Whiteside, and since then he has had a very good boarding-house and a comfortable stopping-place.

He made his first purchase, a tract of eighty acres, in 1895, and rented besides. He started with a six-horse team-six young horses which he had purchased for ninety dollars-paying also $110 for collars and harness to go with them. That was in the blessed days of the Grover Cleveland admin- istration, but he stayed with the job and won out. He rented 600 acres be- sides his own eighty. Then he sold the eighty and bought 130 on the West Side, and afterwards sold that. Still later he purchased, in 1905, the 240 acres where his house now stands. This was then all raw land-not a stroke of improvement on the acreage.

He built his house, a fine large two-story frame, hard-plastered structure, well furnished with modern conveniences, putting it up in 1906 at a cost of $4,000. He built two barns and an Indiana silo, forty feet high, with a capac- ity of 105 tons. In 1917, also, he put down an artesian well, sinking it to the second water-level at 1,040 feet, so that he has a flow of 125 gallons per minute. He has a fifteen-horsepower R. & V. distillate engine which pumps the water into tanks, and thence it passes by means of the gravity system, into the house, barns and troughs, and for irrigation. Besides his home ranch, he operates about 700 acres which he rents.

His largest crop for any year was 9,000 sacks of wheat, or eighteen sacks to an acre, harvested in 1901, but the financial returns were not as great, as in other years, since he was able to sell it for only eighty-five cents a

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hundred-weight. Perhaps 1917 was his most prosperous year, for he then made $30,000.

His parents both died in Tennessee; his father died where he was born, on the old Williams place, in 1900, aged seventy-two years, and the mother in 1903, in her sixty-eighth year. They had fifteen children, of whom four- teen grew up, among whom there are two ministers in the Missionary Bap- tist Church. Grandfather Williams was born in North Carolina, and Grand- father Tune, the progenitor of Mrs. Williams, was born in Halifax County, Va. His mother was Sarah Ann Tune before her marriage, and she was a native of Tennessee. Both these families reach back in an interesting way in Ameri- can history. The Williamses are of an old Colonial-American family, and figured in the Revolutionary War and in the formative period of the nation ; while Grandfather Tune was a soldier in the Mexican War. Samuel B. Wil- liams is the twelfth child, and the baby of the family is Jarmon W. Williams, a vineyardist near Clovis. He and Samuel are the only ones in Fresno County.

Samuel attended the public schools of Tennessee, where he received a fair educational drill, the many benefits of which are seen in his subsequent prosperity. He owns and uses two autos, and he owns and runs one com- bined Holt harvester and thresher, a thirty-two-horsepower machine. He has recently purchased a twenty-five-horsepower Yuba tractor to pull it. and he also hires a tractor at times to plow. He has thirty brood mares, and breeds and raises mules, and he has three Spanish jacks, and he has thirty- five head of colts, mules and work-horses. He boasts a big team of eight draft horses, and hires out horses and mules, and he has received $8.000 in rentals from the said eight-horse team inside of three years. He is also en- gaged in breeding registered prize-taking Hampshire hogs.

Mr. Williams has served as road supervisor in the Helm road section of the Fourth Supervisorial District for the past sixteen years, and he is still on the job there also. He has served as deputy state warden. He is also on the school board and the ditch board. He has just been appointed director- at-large of the Fresno County Farm Bureau. A Democrat in national poli- tics, Mr. Williams works without partisanship in any good cause designed to benefit the community. He is the presiding officer of the San Joaquin Valley Baptist Association, and is on the board of directors of the Northern Cali- fornia Baptist Association. He has been a Sunday school superintendent for a quarter of a century. He has also been a generous supporter of Indian missions in California, under the Baptist Church.

In matters political as in religious, Mr. Williams contends strongly for what is right and just, or what he thinks may be so, and when land specu- lators sought to charge the lands of private individuals in this section with a tax of approximately seventeen dollars per acre for alleged reclamation bene- fits, Mr. Williams was the leader to take the side of the smaller landowners, organized the defense, and won out, and thereby won the gratitude of his friends and neighbors.

Mr. Williams was brought up a strict Baptist in Tennessee, by Christian parents, and he contributes liberally of his means to the work of that denom- ination, in which he has become a pillar of strength. He is a man of clean and correct habits, and neither drinks, smokes nor chews, and, with a rare spiritual vision, seems to get on the right side of every moral and political question, and then he has the courage of his convictions. His strong execu- tive force has called him to leadership in church and state, and he gave $2,000 to the Baptist Indian Missions of California. He is on the board of the Nipinimuwsa Mission in Mariposa County, and he has been furnishing the money to build the mission. The Indians call him Big Chief, and clap him on the back, for all that he does for them. An Indian girl of the Mono tribe, named Miss Mattie Jackson, has been taken into the family of Mr. Williams, and attends the New Hope School, where he is a trustee. At the thirty-eighth

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annual session of the San Joaquin Valley Baptist Association, held in the Fowler Baptist Church, from April 30 to May 3, 1918, Mr. Williams delivered a stirring address. Another key-note address was delivered by Mr. Williams at Tulare, on the occasion of the Thirty-ninth Session, April 15, 1919, and his words are truly prophetic of that better day which Christian people have looked forward to ever since the days of Christ-a kingdom of love and right- eousness, which is surely dawning.

GEORGE CLYDE MARRIOTT .- One of the more recent comers to the Laguna de Tache is George Clyde Marriott who was born in Van Buren County, Iowa, November 26, 1873. He is at present renting the Harlan Ranch, while waiting to take possession of the fine eighty-acre ranch a quarter of a mile north of Linn station on the Hanford and Summit Lake Railway, which he purchased in January, 1919. He is the youngest son of William S., and Lizzie (Alfrey), Marriott, well-known in Van Buren County, Iowa. The father having reached an age of seventy-six, is living retired at Bentonsport, Iowa, after a lifetime of hard work as a farmer. The parents were married near Bentonsport. Mr. Marriott's mother who was born in Clark County, Mo., is also still living. Five children were born to the parents, namely : William L., who is a farmer, near Bentonsport, Iowa; Thomas J., resides at Yale, Carroll County, Mo., where he is a farmer ; Emma who is the wife of F. A. Cross and resides in Colorado; George Clyde, who is the sub- ject of this sketch, and Annie, who is the wife of Col. C. C. Beer, of Kings- burg, Cal.

G. C. Marriott grew up on his father's eighty-acre farm and attended the public schools of Van Buren County, Iowa. At the age of twenty-five he was married to Miss Hannah S. De Hart, who was born and reared in the same county, and was a daughter of Albert De Hart, who owned a fine 200-acre farm and was very prominent in public matters in his own county and town- ship. After marriage George Clyde Marriott farmed his father-in-law's farm for two years; then went to Oklahoma where he filed on a claim, but moved back to Iowa the next year and bought a farm and farmed it for two years when he sold it and moved to Nebraska, but after one year moved back again to Iowa and farmed for several years until he came to California in the year 1907. He settled on the Laguna de Tache September 1, 1907, only after a careful examination of. Northern California by driving, camping out, observ- ing and interviewing. He is well satisfied with the Laguna de Tache where he is taking a rank among its most influential and successful ranchers. He sold a fine thirty-acre ranch lying three miles west of Laton, in 1914, after improving it. He has owned other lands and farmed successfully ever since coming to the grant. The old pioneer, Elisha Harlan, died in February, 1919, and Mr. Marriott is ably running the Harlan ranch at the present time. Mr. and Mrs. Marriott have become the parents of four children : Albert Blaine, who is a senior in the Riverdale high school; Ivan O'Keith who is a junior and Loretta May. Juineta, next to the youngest was born and died in Cali- fornia. Though not a blind partisan Mr. Marriott adheres to the principles of the Republican Party; Mr. and Mrs. Marriott and family are members of the Church of the Brethren.

FRANK EDGAR ABBOTT .- A native son of California who has worked himself up by his own exertions from the bottom of the ladder to a position of influence and trust is Frank Edgar Abbott, born at Sanger, Fresno County, Cal., September 21, 1890. He was reared in Los Angeles and received his education in the public schools, which he supplemented later in life by completing a course in the International Correspondence School. When a lad of nine years he began paddling his own canoe and contributed to the support of his family. He first worked at anything he could get to do, then followed ranch work, driving a ten-mule team in Southern California, and also a season in Yuba County, then he worked in the mines near Mojave;

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where he also drove a ten-horse team; he also worked at dairying and rode after cattle. In Los Angeles he entered the employ of the Los Angeles Saddle and Finding Company, learned collar-making ; he began at $7.00 a week and when he quit was receiving $26.00.

In 1909 he concluded to try his luck in the oil fields, so on August 2, 1909, he came to Coalinga and entered the employ of the Standard Oil Com- pany, on Section 28 in the gas engine department and during the nine months he was never off the lease, for after his day's work of ten hours was over he worked learning tool dressing and at the end of that time he was promoted to tool dresser which he continued for eighteen months; then he became a driller and worked in the production department until August 15, 1918, when he was promoted to foreman of the Continental on Section 2 for the Standard Oil Company, in the Coalinga department, since which time he has had charge of and built up the lease, drilling new wells, as well as the production of twenty-one wells. He has always put in long hours and by study, research and close application he has won an assured position for himself.

His maternal grandfather, Jesse Reed Edgar, was born in Tennessee, he married Elizabeth Ragsdale, a native of Kentucky. They migrated from Arkansas to California in 1859, crossing the plains with ox teams, and locat- ing at what is now Sanger, Fresno County, where he owned 500 acres, a part of it is now the city of Sanger. Here he raised stock and followed freighting until his death. Their daughter, Mattie, was a year old when they crossed the plains and she well remembers and converses well of the early days of Centerville and Sanger; she joined her son Frank in Coalinga in 1910, and since then presides over his home. He is very good and kind to his mother and she is equally solicitous for his welfare.

Mr. Abbott, in about 1913, was sent by the Standard to the Fresno Fair, where he installed a miniature oil farm as a part of their exhibit in the sales department, which he had charge of during the fair. The farm as well as the exhibit caused favorable comment and attracted much attention. He was made a Mason in 1913 in Coalinga Lodge No. 387, F. & A. M., and is also a member of Coalinga Chapter No. 114, R. A. M. His interest in educational work is manifested as a trustee at Max Station school district.

N. PETER JENSEN .- An enterprising business man who thoroughly understands the responsible work he has for years undertaken, that of build- ing and repairing public roads, and whose civic pride has inspired him to develop one of the most attractive of home places, is N. Peter Jensen, the kind-hearted and liberal Danish-American so popular with everybody since he first came to Fresno County in the middle eighties. He was born in Fyen, Denmark, in 1877, the son of Soren Jensen, a native of that country who was married there to Carrie Hansen. In 1883 Soren Jensen came out to Cali- fornia on a kind of prospecting tour, and he spent the first year in Fresno Colony ; then he passed a year in San Luis Obispo, in the employ of Steele Bros., but later he returned to Fresno County. His wife and family of three children joined him in 1886, and the next year he bought a ranch in West Park. Here began his experiments in viticulture on a ranch of ten acres; and when he had progressed somewhat, he bought twenty acres more, so that eventually he owned thirty fine acres. These he managed until 1908, when he sold out and retired to a quiet life with his children. Six years later. full of years and honors, respected and liked by everyone, he died, having al- most reached his seventy-second year. Mrs. Jensen, who passed away in 1910, was the mother of three children: Sena, who became Mrs. H. P. Lar- sen and resides in the Pomona school district; N. Peter, of this sketch; Marius, a rancher in Barstow,-and all are worthy of the family name.

Brought up in.Denmark until he came to America and Fresno County, Peter attended the public schools of West Park, and from a lad helped in the vineyard, assisting his father until he was twenty years old. Arriving at

I. P. Jansen

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the threshold of manhood, he began to do for himself; and then, buying a farm outfit, with a harvester and eight mules, he leased land from the Bank of Central California. He put his hand to the plow in vigorous fashion, and soon he was planting some 2,000 acres to grain. This decidedly extensive farm he ran for three years, and although he harvested good crops, wheat was sold at such a low figure that he could realize no profit, and finding that his labor was in vain, he quit and turned to other fields.

He then engaged in contract work, undertaking to level and check lands ; and he found plenty to do in Vinland, Empire, Barstow and other colonies, so that he continued in that line for four years. Then he bought a ranch in the Barstow Colony- forty acres of raw land requiring hard work in leveling and checking to make it ready for alfalfa-growing-and a fifteen-acre orchard of peaches. This time he was permitted to see a reward for his industry, and once more was on the road to prosperity.

In the meantime Mr. Jensen had continued contract-leveling and check- ing, until he was appointed road-overseer under Chris Jorgensen, in January, 1907 ; and this position he has held to everybody's satisfaction ever since. He used to work fifty-two head of mules on the roads, but lately he has been using two caterpillars in this district-a Holt of forty-five horsepower, and another of seventy-five. He also uses a truck and eight to ten horses. He works from the highway west for five miles beyond Kerman and from the river to McMullen Station. These caterpillars are owned by the county, and their use and upkeep alone involve care and responsibility. When Mr. Jensen took office, the roads were poor in this section ; and since then the best have been constructed, usually at the rate of about forty miles each winter. In 1916 he worked about 220 miles of road, and in 1917 a good 250, and more each year, so that now he may point with pride to the excellent highways con- structed under his supervision.

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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 II, Part 105

Author: Vandor, Paul E., 1858- Publication date: 1919 Publisher: Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company Number of Pages: 1424

Author: Vandor, Paul E., 1858-
Publication date: 1919
Publisher: Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company
Number of Pages: 1424