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 84

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 84

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Mr. Turner has always taken a live interest in politics, even beyond the lines of Republican activity, and has more and more identified himself with civic affairs, although not aspiring to public office; and with his good wife he is always ready to help in every movement for the advancement of the community.

EMERY E. CAUBLE .- Another late pioneer who sees a great future for Fresno County, as the home of both the horticulturist and the viticulturist, is Emery E. Cauble, an ever industrious, honest and genial Hoosier who first came here in the early part of this century. He was born in Washington County, Ind., on December 1, 1873, the son of Alexander Cauble, a native of the same state, who was a farmer and served for three years as a sergeant in the Union Army, in Company E of the Fifth Indiana Cavalry. He had mar- ried Susanna Morris, a daughter of Indiana, who died in her native state, the mother of seven children, six of whom are living.

The youngest in the family, Emery was brought up on a farm, and at- tended both public and private schools, topping off his studies with a com- mercial course. He remained home until he was twenty-one, and then he became a photographer and jeweler in Campbellsburg, Ind. For four years he conducted what was one of the notable establishments of the town; and when he sold out in 1903, it was to turn his face toward the shores of the Pacific.

On coming to California, he settled in Fresno County, and for the first season he went in for lumbering. Then he moved to Kerman and for a season sold nursery stock. Meantime, he was looking about and getting well- acquainted with Central California conditions. During this period, he bought his present attractive place of forty acres on Dakota Avenue, built on it, and made numerous improvements, including a pumping plant and a tractor. A part of it he has devoted to the growing of alfalfa, and he has a fine orchard and vineyard. He has eight and a half acres of Thompson seedless grapes, fifteen acres of Muir, Lowell and Elberta peaches, and seven acres of apricots.

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For some years he was also in the poultry business, and he conducted a first- class apiary ; and he still has an apiary of fifty colonies.

E. E. Cauble was married, in 1910, to Miss Eva J. Cummings, a native daughter of San Francisco, whose father was J. J. Cummings, a Canadian who settled in the Bay metropolis, where she was reared and educated. They have one child, Susie.

Mr. Cauble was made a Mason in the Robert Morris Lodge, No. 282, in Campbellsburg, Ind., and he is still a member there. Both Mr. and Mrs. Cau- ble assisted to organize the Beulah United Brethren Church at Vinland, and he has been secretary of the church and assistant superintendent of the Sun- day School. He is a member and a stockholder of the California Peach Grow- ers, Inc., and also of the California Associated Raisin Company ; he served as local reporter of crops, and has now the honor of being the crop reporter from Fresno County for the United States Government. In national politics Mr. Cauble is a Republican, but he knows no party distinctions when local issues are at stake, and endeavors to support heartily every movement for the improvement and advancement of the community in which he resides.

JESS L. WILLIAMS .- A wide-awake, enterprising and successful young business man, whose progress has been greeted with satisfaction by all who are interested in the advancement of Selma as one of the most de- sirable places of residence in all California, is Jess L. Williams, the new proprietor of the Economy Meat Market, long so famous under the manage- ment of Walter Staley. His full or proper name is Jesse, but his popularity in the fraternal town is characterized by the use of the shorter and more takeable form of "Jess."

He was born at Marionville, Lawrence County, Mo., on September 17, 1895, the son of S. D. and Elizabeth Williams, both of whom are, happily, still living, and at Selma, the only boy in a family having two girls, and he came to Petaluma, Cal., with his parents, and there attended the public schools. His father being a butcher, he soon began to help at the trade; and now, having profited by an instruction he might never have received if working for a stranger, he knows the butcher business from A to Z. More than that, he knows the ins and outs of the meat trade in their relation to modern conditions, especially the great problems of the high cost of living, and so is both able and willing to do his best by his patrons to help them adjust themselves to present-day vexing conditions. He is still fortunate in having the cooperation of his father, who does the slaughtering and the outside work, and who assists him at the block on Saturdays, when the rush, a clear indication of the fine trade he is doing, is on. He has an up-to-date refrigerator and first-class outfit, and handles only the best qualities of fresh and salted meats.

At Selma, in 1916, Mr. Williams was married to Miss Eliza Dill, the daughter of A. Dill, the well-known contractor now of Fowler; and their union has been blessed with one child, Evelyn. Jess belongs to the Foresters, and is an active and valued member in that favorite organization.

GUST. HOKANSON .- A naturalized American whose appreciation of the many advantages offered by California and whose work as a "booster" of the Golden State are the more valuable because he is a well-read and well- posted man, is Gust. Hokanson, who came to California nearly a decade ago. He was born in Jacobstorp, Blekinge, Sweden, September 29, 1867, the son of Hokan Monson, a farmer, who came to Minnesota in 1886, and who had a farm at Moose Lake, which he greatly improved; and there he died. The mother was Emma Christene Gustafson before her marriage, and she now resides in the Vinland district, enjoying life at the good old age of seventy. She had ten children, of whom seven are still living.

Gust., the oldest of the family, attended the public schools in Sweden, and grew up on a farm. Then he learned the trade of bookbinder at Karlskrona,

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Sweden. In 1887 he came to America and went to Hartford, Conn., where he worked for the summer in the neighboring quarries. When he moved west it was to stop at West Superior, Wis., where he worked in town for some five years. After that he located on Moose Lake, bought a farm, and engaged in general farming and stock-raising.

Attracted by an article from C. G. Petersen telling of the climate and soil of Vinland, Cal., all of which appealed to him, he sold out his stock-ranch after thirteen years of farming, and on March 11, 1910, arrived in Fresno County. Two weeks later he bought ten acres of land on Shaw Avenue, one and a half miles west of Vinland Church, in the Vinland district; and having improved it in the best possible manner he now has five acres of Thompson's seedless grapes and five acres in peach and apricot orchard. In 1917 he made a trip back to Minnesota, but he was glad to return to his California ranch, now the pride of his eye and the admiration of his neighbors.

Mr. Hokanson attends the Swedish Lutheran Church at Vinland, and participates in its religious and social activities. True to Republican princi- ples, he endeavors to improve citizenship and to promote civic interest.

CHRIS THOMPSON HANSEN .- A thoroughly experienced and well- informed ranchman, who is as liberal as he is enterprising, and enjoys the pleasing reputation of having a heart as large as an ox, is Chris Thompson Hansen, who first reached California through the Golden Gate in the spring of 1909. He was born at Bregninge, the island of Ero, Denmark, on June 29, 1890, and grew up on the dairy farm of his father, Hans Hansen. Thus his real name was Chris Thompson Hansen, but owning to the number of per- sons by that name, he early abandoned the full title and is known through his two Christian prefixes.

After having attended the excellent Danish schools until he was four- teen years of age, Chris began to paddle his own canoe, and by April, 1909, landed in New York City, brimful of the laudable ambition to work out his destiny and attain his fortune in the American republic. Having reached San Francisco, he had his steps directed to Newman in this state, where he worked awhile at dairying, but it was only for a couple of years, a still better field awaiting him.

In 1911, having heard of the undeveloped resources and the greater op- portunities at Tranquillity, Mr. Thompson moved here and purchased thirty acres of land. It was decidedly raw and not overinviting to the eye, but he was not discouraged because he had to put the first plow into it. He leveled and checked, and then planted the acreage to alfalfa; and there, fortified by considerable experience and much natural ability, enabling him both to for- see and to adapt, as well as to apply the latest word in science, he has con- tinued dairying and poultry-raising.

Mr. Thompson has been, in fact, phenomenally successful in keeping his valuable place in excellent shape, and on this account he is widely esteemed by all who know him, and no one better deserves the good will of the com- munity. California may well congratulate Denmark on the quality of the sons she has sent out to the Golden State, prominent among whom must be mentioned Chris Thompson.

FRED WISTROM .- Many men who have come within the hospitable confines of Fresno County but poorly blessed with this world's goods have within a short time made a place for themselves in the community and have amassed a comfortable fortune, a fact which can be pointed to with pride, both by themselves and by the other progressive citizens of this prosperous community. Among these men may be mentioned Fred Wistrom, a resident here since 1900. He is a native of Sweden, born and raised on a farm, and followed that occupation until he came to the United States, in 1882. On ar- rival in the new country, he first located in St. Paul, Minn., and secured em- ployment there. He later engaged in lumber work in the sawmill at Pinery,

Bruterick being and family

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HISTORY OF FRESNO COUNTY

Wis. Mr. Wistrom returned to St. Paul in 1884, and there his marriage occurred, to Anna Charlotte Carlson, also of Swedish birth. He was em- ployed in St. Paul in a sash and door manufactory, and later engaged in the teaming business for himself, and finally became elevator operator in a bus- iness block in that city and followed that occupation until he came to California.

With the desire to seek new opportunities in the western state, Mr. Wistrom located in Fresno, in 1900, and soon after his arrival went to work for Thomas Patterson, owner of the Patterson Block, and when Patterson and Forsyth erected the new Forsyth Building, in 1904, Mr. Wistrom be- came head janitor of the building, which position he has held since that date.

Mr. Wistrom has speculated more or less in real estate in Fresno, and has met with splendid success in his business ventures. Among other prop- erties, he bought, in 1908, ten acres of the Barton vineyards, on Belmont Avenue, paying a purchase price of $2,000 for the acreage, and later selling it for $3,000. He is the owner of a fine $5,000 home at 403 Calaveras Avenue and altogether, through his own good judgment and steady application, has accumulated a competency, and while having but a small amount of money on his arrival here, now is in comfortable circumstances financially, and has won the respect and liking of his fellow citizens. During his residence here Mr. Wistrom has been an active worker in the Swedish Mission Church, was for five years treasurer of the church body, and is now a deacon. He has taken one trip back to his old home in Sweden since locating in Fresno, and two trips back to St. Paul. Three children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Wistrom: Milton, book-keeper in Madary's Planing Mill ; Ellen, wife of Paul Thiely, of Fresno ; and Clinton, now a high school student.

FREDERICK HEINZ .- A good California "booster" who has done much to improve the country to the west of Riverdale, in the Summit Lake district, is Frederick Heinz, a hard-working, active and highly intelligent rancher, who is popularly known as Fred Heinz by his wide circle of friends, every one of whom finds him under all circumstances affable and approachable.

He was born at Shelbyville, Ill., on July 31, 1864, the son of John Philip and Dorothea (Doudt) Heinz, who came from Germany in 1840 and settled at Carondolet, a suburb of St. Louis. The father was a shoemaker, but in 1866 he removed to Shelbyville and there bought a farm. In 1881 Mrs. Heinz died at the age of fifty-four, and two years later Mr. Heinz passed away in his sixty-eighth year. The parents were married in St. Louis and they had eleven children, among whom were two who died in infancy. Nine grew to maturity and seven are now living. Frederick was next to the youngest, and he is the only one now in California. Four live in Shelby County, Ill .; a sister resides in Chicago; and another sister is in Louisiana; and an older brother of the subject, John Lewis, is in charge of the Shelby County Poor Farm, and has been there for twenty-three years.

Growing up on his father's farm in Shelby County, Frederick attended the public schools there and was brought up in the German Lutheran Church. He became a contractor for railroad ties and other supplies and for hard- wood lumber, and built by contract the first telephone line from Shelbyville to Decatur, Ill. He also became foreman and later bridge carpenter on the Chicago & Eastern Illinois Railway. In these several responsibilities, Mr. Heinz always acquitted himself most creditably.

On October 19, 1898, Mr. Heinz was married to Miss Eunice M. Shew- make, of Effingham County, Ill., a native of that section and the daughter of Joseph and Anna Shewmake. Her father was a veteran of the Civil War and her grandfather was a captain. Seven children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Heinz, of whom four are living: Eleta, now married to Robert Abell; Victor ; Carl; and Myrtle. Although formerly a Lutheran, Mr. and Mrs. Heinz and family attend the United Brethren Church at Riverdale.

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After his marriage, Mr. Heinz became a sewer contractor and built the sewers constructed at Shelbyville between 1898 and 1900. In the latter year he came to California, and went to Riverdale, where his friend, Mr. Henson, the present postmaster, had located. For some time he ran a cream-receiving station at Riverdale for George A. Smith of Los Angeles; and at the end of two years he bought fifty acres due south of Riverdale. He lived there four or five years, operated the farm, and rented some 200 acres besides. After that he rented the J. W. Beall tract of 200 acres, across the road from where he is now living; and having run that place for several years, he bought his present property, twenty-nine acres in two different pieces on the Burrel and Lanare Road, four miles southeast of Burrel and two and a half miles north- west of Lanare. This is on what, fifteen years ago, was the Browning Tract; and later it became a part of the Summit Lake Investment holdings. He has thirty head of heifers, high grade Holsteins, with a registered bull, and twelve head of draft horses.

It was fifteen years ago that Mr. Heinz came to Riverdale, and seven- teen years since he has been in California for the first time; and in these years he has done good work as a citizen, boosting for the railroad, aiding in the sale of liberty bonds, and also helping to support the Red Cross, and becoming the popular public weighmaster at the Bender station. Recently he has demonstrated his enterprise anew by purchasing an additional eighty acres, making his total holdings 109 choice acres of land.

JOHN AUGUST NICKLASON .- An industrious, far-seeing and suc- cessful man, of pleasing personality, is John August Nicklason, who came to Fresno County in January, 1905, and who has been helping to develop the resources of Central California ever since. He was born in Smoland. Sweden, County Konebergslan, on January 21, 1868, the son of Nicholas J. Peterson, a farmer who, in 1886 brought his family to Minnesota, settled at Moorhead, Clay County, and there engaged in farming. He died near Minne- apolis, Minn. His wife had been Magdalena Johanson before her marriage, and she also died at the same place, the mother of seven children, among whom our subject is the fourth eldest. He attended the public schools, and from his fourteenth year was apprenticed to a book-binder in Karlskrona.

Arriving in Minnesota, he went to work on a farm, and after a while rented land and engaged in raising wheat for himself, and in this, as in whatever he undertook, he enjoyed an encouraging measure of success.

Two days after Christmas, in 1895, Mr. Nicklason was married to Miss Hilda Christene Johansen, who was born in Smoland, Sweden, the daughter of Johann, a farmer there, and of Sarah Johansen, both of whom died there. Mrs. Nicklason was the second oldest in the family, and came to Moorhead in 1894. The wedding took place in that town, and was one of the social events of the year.

Stirred by some letters from the Rev. M. A. Nordstrom, written from Vinland, Mr. Nicklason, in January, 1905, came to Fresno, and the same day bought twenty acres on Madera Avenue and twenty acres on Shaw Avenue, later selling twenty and retaining twenty. It was raw land, but he planted it to alfalfa, and set out a peach orchard of five acres, planted apri- cots and then grubbed them out and set out nine acres of Thompson seedless grapes. He built a residence and erected the necessary ranch-buildings. He became a member and a stockholder in the California Peach Growers, Inc., and the California Associated Raisin Company.

Mr. and Mrs. Nicklason have eight children: Ruth, who is Mrs. A. Linberg, of Oakland; Alma, who also resides in that city; Gerdar and Nora, who attend the Kerman High School; and Eldor, Anna, Edwin, and Carl, at home. Mr. Nicklason, who works for good citizenship in the ranks of the Republican party, helped build the Swedish Lutheran Church at Vinland, having also assisted to organize the congregation, and he is now deacon of the church.

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JOHN HILL .- Mr. Hill, now deceased, was a pioneer of Fresno County. He was a native of Cambridge, England, and came to this country when he was about seventeen years of age, locating for a time in New York state. Later he went to Waukesha County, Wis., where he engaged in farming until 1880, when he came to California. He located in Merced County near what was then Hills Ferry, now Newman, and bought forty acres which he set to orchard and operated for a time. He then went to Armona, Tulare County, where he owned a ranch and engaged in raising alfalfa and fruits. In 1887 he homesteaded 160 acres four miles east of Coalinga. Mr. Hill operated both places until 1889, when he sold his Armona ranch and made his permanent home on the Coalinga ranch raising grain. He later rented his ranch for grainraising, and devoted all of his time to the poultry business in which he was successful. His ranch is greatly improved, with its irrigating ditches, and all that goes to make a profitable place in California. It has now passed into other hands, having been sold. He died June 11, 1916.

Mr. Hill married Mrs. Carrie J. (Johnson) Slater, who was born in Groves End, County Kent, England, but who came to the United States when but a small girl with her parents, Benjamin and Mary Johnson who located at Milwaukee, Wis. Her first husband was William Slater, born in Lancashire, England. He was a stockdealer and butcher on the corner of Third and Grand where now stands the Schlitz Hotel. He died while in bus- iness in 1875. To them were born two children, one grew up, a daughter, Grace Isabelle, now Mrs. A. B. Hill, of Coalinga, who married a son of John Hill by his first marriage. Mr. and Mrs. John Hill have three children: Clarence J., superintendent of the Oil Wells Supply Company, of Coalinga ; Florence M., wife of H. C. Gardner, of Chandler, Ariz. ; and Arthur E., who enlisted in the United States Navy in February, 1917. He served until his discharge in February, 1919, and is now with the Shell Company at Oilfields. By his first marriage to Maria Daubner, Mr. Hill had two sons: Frank E. of Fresno and Albert Burton who died in 1907.

John Hill was a man of sterling worth, of upright character, one whose word was as good as his bond. He was a self-made man of a type that is Old England's boast. Sturdy, reliable and unafraid, difficulties only made him the more efficient, and he lived to see the fruits of his labor.

JAMES HANSEN .- James Hansen represents the enterprise, thrift, and progressive spirit, so typical of the West. He is a native of Odense, Island of Fyen, Denmark, where he was born February 5, 1869. Denmark has given to the United States many of her best citizens and California has received her share of these thrifty men, who have greatly aided in the development of the viticultural and horticultural interests of Fresno County. He is a son of Hans and Anna Hansen, the father having been a Danish farmer who passed away in that country, after which the mother came to America and settled at Fremont, Nebr., where she resided until her death. Ten children of Mr. and Mrs. Hansen grew up, James, the subject of this review being the fifth child. His early education was received in the public schools of his native country.

In 1888, James Hansen came to the United States and, on May 4, arrived in Fremont, Nebr., where he secured work on the horse ranch of Bluthe & Balding, and for two years was engaged in the hazardous undertaking of breaking bronchos. Afterwards for two years he worked on the John P. Eaton ranch and then started farming for himself by renting land and engaging in raising corn and hogs. Later he purchased a farm and after three years sold it and bought 160 acres in Cedar County, Nebr. While living there the seasons were very dry and consequently the crops were unprofitable. Mr. Hansen then returned to Fremont where he engaged in farming. In 1907 he sold his interests in Nebraska and migrated to California, locating in Fresno County, where he purchased a forty-acre vineyard, in the Malaga section, which he

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operated one year. As the returns from his vineyard were not profitable, he pulled up the vines and planted alfalfa, and then engaged in the dairy bus- iness. Later, Mr. Hansen traded his vineyard for ten acres on Fig Avenue, adjoining the city of Fresno. Afterwards, for two years, he engaged in the real estate business in Fresno, where he conducted the Danish Land Office.

In August, 1913, he located in the vicinity of Kerman, where he purchased five acres in the Dakota Colony, and two years later bought thirty acres nearby, which was but a wild willow-patch. With the help of a stump-puller, he grubbed out twenty acres of this seemingly good-for-nothing land and now has thirty-five acres of tillable land, five acres being planted to emperor, eight to sultana, and ten to Thompson seedless grapes; and five acres to alfalfa. The remaining acreage he expects to plant to Thompson seedless and sultana vines.

While living in Fremont, Nebr., James Hansen was united in marriage with Miss Hansine Ohlrick, a native of Denmark. This union has been blessed with three children: Annie, who lives in Oakland; Maria, who is now Mrs. W. F. Parker of Berkeley; and Charles, who served as a member of the Twenty-first Infantry, U. S. A., stationed at Fort Douglas, Utah, until he was discharged and who is now helping his father.

Mr. Hansen is an exceptionally good farmer and thoroughly understands viticulture. He deserves great credit for making an undesirable tract of land to "blossom and bloom as a rose."

ILA T. GROUNDS .- Fourteen miles northwest of Fresno, in the Biola district, is located the cattle ranch of I. T. Grounds, who specializes in raising pure-bred, short-horn cattle, of which he is the proud possessor of a fine herd I. T. Grounds was born on the celebrated Truxton cattle ranch at Hackberry Mojave County, Ariz., January 20, 1878. His father, W. F. Grounds, is a na · tive of Arkansas, and when six years of age was taken by his parents to Tom Green County, Texas, where they were raising cattle. In 1872, W. F. Grounds brought a drove of cattle to Arizona, and in 1876 brought out the balance of his herd and established the Truxton Ranch on the old Truxton-Beal trail, known as the Santa Fe trail, a large and valuable cattle ranch which he sold, to engage in mining, which precarious vocation he followed until 1888, when he again engaged in cattle-raising at Clay Springs, Ariz., until 1900.

In 1901, W. F. Grounds located in the City of Fresno, but continued to deal in cattle and operate his ranch. He resides at 700 San Pablo Avenue, Fresno, and is now sixty-six years of age. His wife, before her marriage, was Melissa Cureton, a native of Texas. Eleven children were born to Mr. and Mrs. W. F. Grounds, nine of whom are living, I. T. Grounds, of this re- view, being the oldest child. He was reared in Arizona, assisting his father on the ranch until he was twenty-one years old, when he ran cattle, together with his father's stock. Until he came to California, I. T. Grounds continued in the cattle business at Clay Springs, Ariz., with his brother, William F., Jr., at which time he dissolved the partnership and shipped his cattle to California.

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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 84

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