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 13

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 13

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LUCIUS POWERS .- Ever since the stirring days of '49, the Powers family has been identified with the history of California. The founder of the family on the coast was Aaron Hubbard Powers, a native of New Hamp- shire, but from early childhood a resident of Boston, Mass. At the time of the discovery of gold in California, he took passage on a sailing vessel and after a long voyage, by way of Cape Horn, landed at the Golden Gate in 1849, whence he proceeded with other Argonauts, to the mines. Eventually he be- came engaged in business in Sacramento, where he continued for twenty years. Upon retiring from commercial life in 1887, he purchased 250 acres of land west of Centerville, Fresno County, and soon afterwards planted 100 acres of the tract to fruits of various kinds ; also set out a large vineyard.

In 1898, he took his son Lucius into full partnership with him, Lucius at that time becoming active manager of the property. When Aaron H. Powers married, he chose for his wife Emma Louisa Sweasy, a native of London, England, whose death occurred at the home ranch near Centerville, July 24, 1902, at the age of sixty-five years. Aaron Hubbard Powers, the founder of the family in California, while making a trip around the world, died in the city of Venice, Italy, April 17, 1907. There were six sons and three daughters in the family of this pioneer couple, seven of whom are living; Lucius, the subject of this sketch, being next to the youngest.

Lucius Powers was born in Sacramento, January 11, 1872, and attended school there until fifteen years of age, when he removed with his parents to Centerville, Fresno County, where he completed his school days. An inci- dent of his youth indicates his progressive and enterprising disposition: in 1889, when seventeen years of age, he established the Kings River News, a four-page sheet, six by eight inches in size, published every week. The peo- ple of the community around Centerville, which had no publication of its own, appreciated his efforts to give them the news of current interest, their support encouraged him to increase the paper to eight pages, but after he had published it for two years, other matters required his attention and he discontinued the little publication. After completing a course in a business college in San Francisco, he returned to Fresno County and began his career as a horticulturist, viticulturist and fruit shipper, in which he has become eminently successful.

Entering into partnership with his father, Mr. Powers became the active manager of the Powers vineyards and orchards, and after the death of A. H. Powers, the family incorporated the property in 1909, as the Powers Orchard and Vineyard Company, with a capital stock of $50,000, at which time Lucius Powers was made president and manager. This tract of land under his wise supervision, has become a wonderful producer, and is one of the largest orchards and vineyards in the Centerville district, comprising in all 370 acres ; there are about 150 acres in raisin grapes, forty acres in emperors, eleven acres in oranges, 100 acres in nursery stock, principally oranges, twenty-five acres in figs, and the balance in other fruits and alfalfa. In 1909, Mr. Powers established the L. Powers Fruit Company in Fresno. In 1913 he was chosen manager of the San Joaquin Valley district for the Pioneer Fruit Company, which has packing houses in different cities throughout the state. At present he is vice-president of the concern. In 1912 Mr. Powers moved from the ranch into Fresno, where in Palm Villa Tract he has twenty acres in vineyard, the largest vineyard in the city of Fresno. In 1915 Mr. Powers bought out the interests of his brothers and is now sole owner of the Powers Orchard and Vineyard Company's property.

In 1917 Mr. Powers added to his holdings by purchasing half a section of improved land ten miles east of Fresno, on Belmont Avenue, and in 1919 increased his holdings still further by buying a highly improved malaga vine- yard of 100 acres at Clotho, for which he paid $1,000 an acre. Mr. Powers' extensive experience has demonstrated to him that improved land is the best kind of an investment, as he well knows that with care and good management

Franklin Abbott

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the income from the crops will pay for the land in a few years. He assisted in the organization of the Commercial Bank of Sanger, of which he is vice- president; for several years he served as a director of the First National Bank of Sanger, and in many other ways has shown his deep interest in the development of the best interests of Fresno County, believing that it offers better inducements for the homeseeker than any other part of California.

The marriage of Lucius Powers with Miss Abbie Viau, who was born at Colusa, was celebrated on July 3, 1900. Four children have been born of this union : Lucius, Jr .; Mary Louisa; Martha Kate; and Aaron Hubbard. Fra- ternally, Mr. Powers is a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows; Woodmen of the World; Benevolent Protective Order of Elks; and the Re- bekahs. His social relations are with the Commercial Club, Sequoia Club and Sunnyside Country Club, and his business associations are with the Chamber of Commerce. Other personal interests that claim his attention and manage- ment are : L. Powers Fruit Company ; L. Powers Orange Company ; L. Pow- ers Wood Company ; L. Powers Tree Company ; L. Powers Home Ranch ; L. Powers B Ranch; and the Shoemaker Orchard Company of Lindsay.

Lucius Powers has contributed greatly to the substantial and permanent development of scientific horticulture and viticulture in Fresno County, and there is no man more deeply interested in the progress made in the develop- ment of the State of California than this native son. He is always ready to co-operate in any worthy project which has as its aim the advancement of public interests, either commercially, financially, educationally or socially, and in both county and state Mr. Powers holds an enviable position as an eminently successful business man.

FRANKLIN ABBOTT .- An old settler who has passed through the hardest of hard times, experiencing the failure of grain crops, and starvation prices for that upon which much time and fatiguing labor had been expended, and who, having borne his trials manfully, has won success as a viticulturist is Franklin Abbott, the subject of this review. Mr. Abbott is also an expert teamster and judge of land and cattle, and has raised horses and mules for twenty-eight years, having come to Fresno in the early eighties. He was born near Bloomington, McLean County, Ill., on February 10, 1864, the son of Milo J. Abbott, a native of Maine, who came to Illinois and there settled as a farmer, about 1881 removing to Kansas, and while living at Garden City he died. Milo's wife was Adeline Burt before her marriage, and her native state was New Hampshire. She proved the best of helpmates to her husband, and ended a useful career in Illinois, the mother of thirteen children, six of whom are still living. One of the sons, Andrew, came to Fresno about 1880, and is a rancher at Del Rey.

Franklin was the seventh eldest and grew up on a farm in Illinois. He attended the country schools and remained at home until he was sixteen. Then he went to work for his brother, so that, fortunate in such an advisor, he secured an excellent start for the great tussle with the world. In 1882 the young man came west to California and made his way to Fresno County. Fresno itself was then only a small place with two stores, and the whole country about was a wide stretch of plain, with cattle and sheep, so he went to work in a vineyard and orchard in Washington Colony, where he remained busy until spring, when he went to the mountains with a band of sheep for his cousin, George Rowell. He spent two summers in the mountains in caring for herds, and even if he had gotten nothing else out of the experience, he built up his health and intensified his love for California outdoor life.

Then Mr. Abbott started for himself as a farmer. He bought an outfit and a ten-mule team, and for two years leased land from Dr. Rowell in the Washington Colony. Then he leased 1,200 acres of the Simpson ranch near Academy, and later the Dickinson ranch of 1,500 acres on Dry Creek. For fourteen years he continued there, and in that time raised some big crops.

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He had some failures, due to the low selling prices, being compelled to dis- pose of his barley at times at only ten dollars a ton, White Australian wheat at seventy-three cents a cental, and Sonora wheat at sixty-three cents, so that when he came to balance up, at the end of that time, he found that if he had worked out in the service of others, at twenty-five dollars a month for the fourteen years, he would have been better off than he was through his own enterprise. He raised mules and horses, as many as seventy to 100 head a year, and also cattle, and was rated as doing considerable business. Whatever his luck, he never grumbled; nor did he resort to the "flowing bowl" to drown his disappointment. He found that nothing paid better than to cheerfully peg away.

Reflecting on his past experience, Mr. Abbott determined to buy a small place. In the fall of 1905, therefore, he purchased his present holding of forty acres in the Barstow Colony, and at once began to improve it. He set out twenty acres in peaches and the next year a vineyard and a fine tract of alfalfa ; but until the California Peach Growers, Inc., was formed, the price paid for peaches was so low that it was impossible to realize a profit. Now he belongs to that association, and through collective marketing his orchard enterprise is a success, as also are those of his fellow members. He has ten acres of alfalfa and eleven acres of Thompson and Malaga grapes, and is acknowledged to have one of the finest vineyards in the vicinity. This suc- cess must be the result, in part, of Mr. Abbott's excellent judgment in select- ing his land which also is well watered from the Herndon canal. He has built a fine building, and set around the whole a border of figs.

While at Academy, Mr. Abbott was married to Miss Maud Balev, a native of Oregon, but reared in this state, and the daughter of Henry Balev, a pioneer farmer of Fresno who made a specialty of raising fine standard- bred horses. Nine children make up the family of Mr. and Mrs. Abbott : they are: Gladys, Milburn, Beulah, Frances, Walter, Doris, Marie, Frank and Helen, and all are at home assisting in dispensing that welcome and hos- pitality for which the Abbott household has long been famous. They attend the Presbyterian Church at Barstow, of which Mr. Abbott is a steward, and contribute to the social-center life in the Barstow school, where Mr. Abbott served for three years as a trustee.

Independent in politics, Mr. Abbott has performed much service for the common weal, and has twice served as deputy sheriff, under Sheriffs Chit- tenden and McSwain. He is an instructive talker and has many interesting reminiscences of the days that are gone, and remembers well when he hauled lumber from the mountains to Fresno, and also hauled provisions from Fresno to the mountains, a livelihood being maintained under anything but convenient circumstances.

ROBERT W. BARNWELL .- The growth and prosperity of Fresno is largely due to its diversified industries, although for more than thirty years its principal source of revenue has been and still is that of fruit raising in its various branches, among which the raisin industry is foremost.

One of the most prominent fruit growers and shippers of Fresno is Robert W. Barnwell. He was born in Gilmer, Texas, July 5, 1872, the son of D. M. and Martha (McGee) Barnwell. His father was a native of Georgia and a Confederate soldier during the Civil War, after which he settled in Texas, where he was for a number of years a pioneer farmer and stock raiser, and was also engaged quite extensively in railroad contracting. He arrived in Fresno January 1, 1888, where he purchased forty acres of unimproved land in the West Park Colony Tract which he planted to a vineyard. From time to time he increased his holdings until he now owns 220 acres of vineyard, being one of the large raisin growers of Fresno. He still resides on the forty acre tract which he bought in 1888. His wife is dead. He has been a Mason since twenty-one years of age and is now a

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member of Fresno Lodge, No. 247, F. & A. M. Robert W. received his education at West Park School, Fresno, under the tutelage of the well-known educator E. W. Lindsay, the former county superintendent of schools. As a young man he worked for a short time for his father in his vineyard, after which he became the first fruit buyer for A. L. Hobbs, which position he retained for six years. Later he was a buyer for J. K. Armsby for five years, then went back to Rosenberg for two years and afterwards went in business for himself buying and shipping green and dried fruit, in which business he has been very successful. The yearly shipments of dried fruit run from 1,000 to 1,500 tons, and green fruit from 200 to 300 cars; the total value of the fruit being $500,000.

Mr. Barnwell also owns a dried and green fruit plant in Parlier, and a green fruit plant in Clovis. He has a twenty-acre fig orchard, twenty-acre vineyard and 320 acres of grain land, all in Fresno County. In January, 1919, he sold his fruit business to Kelley and Simpson, and for the time being retired from active operations in the fruit business to look after his own and father's ranch interests. Mr. Barnwell's father and a brother, D. M. Barnwell, Jr. (the present County Clerk of Fresno County), are the only members of the Barnwell family now living. Two sisters and the mother are deceased.

His wife was in maidenhood Miss Arah B. Holcomb of Texas, and they have one daughter, Achsah.

Mr. Barnwell has a large circle of acquaintances and is one of Fresno's well known and highly respected citizens, always to be found at the front in anything that pertains to the welfare and prosperity of the city of his choice. He is a prominent Elk, also a Shriner and a thirty-second degree Mason.

GEORGE R. SHIPP .- A Californian with many interesting memories of the past, particularly of some of the efforts made to secure a right of way for the Santa Fe Railroad, is George R. Shipp, whose father once offered the company 160 acres for a town site, but years later, when they finally built they chose another route. He was born in Holmes County, Miss., on Octo- ber 29, 1865, and his father was William W. Shipp, also a native of Missis- sippi, where he first saw the light in 1834. He was reared in Holmes County and became a farmer; and he served throughout the Civil War. Grandfather Shipp was born in Kentucky, and later he removed to Mississippi. In that state William Shipp was married to Mary J. Strother, a daughter of Missis- sippi ; and in 1868 he brought his wife and three children to California.

Leaving his family in Solano County, he made a trip down the coast and into the San Joaquin Valley, which he reached in the spring of 1868; and being impressed with Fresno County, he decided to locate here and took a preemption on Dry Creek. He returned to Solano County for his family, and then he and Major Nelson purchased a flock of sheep and drove them to Dry Creek, where he engaged in stock-raising.

He also homesteaded 160 acres and rapidly improved the land, and little by little he added more acreage; later he dissolved partnership with Major Nelson and they divided their band of sheep. The Major in 1877 (the dry year), drove his sheep to Arizona, but he lost them all. Mr. Shipp ranged his flock in the mountains and lost only 600 head out of 6,000. He prospered, bought more land, and finally had a ranch of 2,300 acres in a body. Aside from sheep-raising, he also engaged in the raising of grain.

In the fall of 1887 Mr. Shipp sold the land and turned the entire stock over to his son George R. to run them on another ranch he owned on the San Joaquin River, and then he moved to Fresno where he lived retired for a time. Later, however, he again engaged in sheep-raising on his San Joaquin River ranch, although he died at his home in Fresno in 1900. He was a prominent Mason and the father of ten children, two of whom died in Mis- sissippi, while five are now living. Eliza C. has become Mrs. Ambrose of

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Phoenix, Ariz .; George R. is the subject of this sketch; John N. lives at Fresno; Lela M. is Mrs. Neil of the same city; and near by dwells Mary E., Mrs. Hopkins.

Educated at the public schools in Mississippi district in this County and at a private school in Fresno, George assisted in caring for flocks from the time when he was eight years of age and soon became a well-posted and expert sheepman. When fifteen he took charge of the sheep on the range, and in 1887 he bought an interest in them. He also purchased an interest in the stock and took charge of them and the farm on the San Joaquin River, eighteen miles northeast of Fresno. Still later he leased land from the Bank of California, situated near Kerman, where he also ranged his sheep, in the summers taking them to the mountains.

Mr. Shipp also bought ranches near Reedley, and after that he bought in the Scandinavian Colony a vineyard ranch of thirty acres. Next he purchased 3,200 acres, the old home on the San Joaquin River, which he ran for five years and then sold. When sheep were excluded from the Forest Reserve, he started in the cattle business, and his brand, P. P., is one of the oldest in the county.

In 1913 Mr. Shipp sold his ranch and located in Fresno, and later he bought his present ranch of 160 acres on Blackstone Avenue, sixty-five acres of which are in peaches. He is setting out the balance in Calimyrna and white Adriatic figs, and bids fair again to make a great success of his enter- prise. At 305 Clark Street he built his residence.

At the City of the Angels in 1891, Mr. Shipp was married to Miss Abbie W. Webster, a native of Vacaville, Solano County, Cal., and a daughter of G. W. and Jane (Smith) Webster, born in North Carolina and Tennessee respectively, California pioneers of the intrepid company that crossed the great plains with ox teams in 1852 and was a farmer in Vacaville, where Mrs. Shipp was reared. Two children blessed the union: Georgia, who is Mrs. Rheiner, and Harold W., a graduate of the high school, who was a despatch rider in the United States Army serving overseas, he is now ranching near Fresno.

Mr. Shipp is a democrat in national political affairs, and always an energetic supporter of non-partisan movements for the public weal. He be- longs to Fresno Lodge, No. 439, B. P. O. Elks.

EDWIN V. KELLEY .- The part played by science in industry, com- merce, finance and even politics, is a subject of absorbing interest. Cali- fornia has for some time past employed a small army of chemists in almost every conceivable field, whose contributions to present-day progress it would be difficult to estimate, and without whose services it would not have been possible, in numerous cases, to reach the goal attained. Edwin V. Kelley belongs to this group of professional men to whom California owes much, and whose valued services she generously recognizes. He was born at Cadillac, Mich., on August 8, 1875, the son of William and Nancy (Van Ness) Kelley. He attended the grammar and high schools until he was sixteen, and after that he matriculated at the University of Michigan. He studied science at Ann Arbor, and spent three years profitably, concluding his courses of study. Leaving Michigan he went to Illinois, and at Joliet took service as a chemist with the Illinois Steel Company, with which concern he remained for a year. At the end of that time the company transferred him to their South Chicago plant; and there, for another year, he was active in the same capacity.

Mr. Kelley then came to Fresno and established a dry-fruit packing business, which at first met with reverses, due largely to the unsettled financial conditions of that time. This business he managed until 1902, and then moved to Fowler, attracted by an offer to become the manager of Chad- dock & Company, the fruit packers. He was in charge there for six years. Re- turning to Fresno, he became manager of the dried-fruit department of the

M.Vienaral

Mary R. Venard

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California Fruit Canners' Association, a post he held for a year and four months.

Having now gained a reputation for ability of a high order, and ex- perience obtainable only in a practical way, Mr. Kelley was made manager of the J. K. Armsby Co., dried-fruit packers, in which position he was active until the first of November, 1916, when the company was merged with several others into the California Packing Corporation, and he became as- sistant manager of all their sixteen San Joaquin Valley packing houses. Since then, Mr. Kelley has been one of the most progressive and most in- fluential leaders in his field, and now enjoys an enviable reputation through- out the state. On April 1, 1919, he resigned his position with the Cali- fornia Packing Corporation, and embarked in business for himself. He is now the senior member of the firm of Kelley & Simpson, who recently pur- chased the fruit-packing business of R. W. Barnwell.

While in Chicago, on August 1, 1900, Mr. Kelley was married to Lillian Frances Schoonmake, a charming woman whose life was closed all too early-in June, 1915. By her he had one child, Richard V., who is attending the Fresno high school. Mr. Kelley is active in civic affairs, doing his bit politically, generally under the banners of the Republican party. He is a member of the University Club, the Sequoia Club, and the Sunnyside Country Club of Fresno, as well as the University of Michigan Union; and he also belongs to the Elks.

WILLIAM F. VENARD .- Born near Havana, Mason County, Ill., on February 5, 1863, William F. Venard is the son of G. W. Venard, a native of Ohio, whose parents came from New Jersey. He moved to Kansas in 1857, then back to Illinois, and once more came to Kansas. In that state he settled in 1869, at Burlington ; and there he still lives. Mrs. Venard was Anna E. Marshall before her marriage; she was born in Terre Haute, Ind., and in 1874 died in Kansas. She was the mother of four children, two of whom are still living.

The oldest child in the family, William F. was brought up in Kansas, and attended the public schools and Baker University at Baldwin City; and until 1885 he studied dentistry at Burlington. For three years he prac- ticed dental surgery in Nebraska, and then he removed to Florence, Colo., where he continued his professional work. In 1889 he began in the oil busi- ness and worked up in it at Florence. Ten years later, he removed to Cali- fornia and Coalinga and for two months worked for L. L. Cory and associates on the New York lease. Then he was with Captain McClurg on Sec. 33-20-31, drilling for him for four and one-half years. In 1904, he returned to Colorado and worked as a driller until 1910, when he came back to Coalinga.

In February of that year he joined the Good Luck Oil Company as driller, and on the first of the following November, he was made field superintendent, and this responsible position he has held ever since. When he took charge, the company had only two wells, but since then they have put down six more, so that they now have eight first-class producers.

Aside from the oil business, Mr. Venard is greatly interested in viticul- ture. Some years ago, with his son, Charles E., he purchased seventy acres of raw land in Fresno County, between Reedley and Dinuba, which they set out to vineyard and orchard, and brought into bearing, when they sold it at a good profit. Since then he has bought other ranches and sold all but one which is devoted to orchard and vines.

At Burlington, Kans., on June 5, 1889, Mr. Venard was married to Miss Mary A. Throckmorton, a native of Kansas and the daughter of Job Throck- morton, who was born in Ohio and had married Catherine White and who was Provo Marshal during the Civil War. In 1857 they located at Burling- ton, and he was not only a successful farmer, but the county clerk of Coffey County, Kans., and a member of the assembly of the Kansas State Legisla- ture. He died on his farm, survived by his widow who lives at Burlington.

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Four children brightened the home of Mr. and Mrs. Venard, and three grew up: Charles E., at Reedley; William, assisting his father; and Eleanor, a graduate of the Coalinga High School and Heald's Business College, and head bookkeeper in the First National Bank at Coalinga.

Mr. Venard was made a Mason in the Lemoore Lodge, F. & A. M., in 1903, and he is now a member of Coalinga Lodge, No. 387, F. &. A. M., and a member of Coalinga Chapter of the Royal Arch Masons. He and his wife are also members of the Eastern Star at Coalinga, and there, as else- where, are highly esteemed by many friends.

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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 13

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