History of Humboldt 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, Part 33

Author: Irvine, Leigh H. (Leigh Hadley), 1863-1942
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: Los Angeles, Historic Record Company
Number of Pages: 1328

USA > California > Humboldt County > History of Humboldt 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 > Part 33

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Dr. Carmichael for a year, at the close of which time he went to Hanford, remaining there for two years in the employ of Dr. H. T. Hendricks.

It was while he was located at Hanford that the marriage of Dr. Hinman occurred, uniting him with Miss Catherine Cameron, of that city. In Feb- ruary, 1907, he returned to Eureka and purchased the office and practice of Dr. Carmichael, and has since that time conducted the business himself. He has met with deserved success and has won an exceedingly enviable place in the hearts of Eureka citizens. Aside from his professional popularity he is also well and favorably known, and together with Mrs. Hinman participates in the social affairs of the city. He is a prominent member of Eureka Lodge No. 652, B. P. O. E., and is also a member of the Psi Omega, a national dental fraternity. Mrs. Hinman has borne her husband three children, Catherine Helaine, James Roderick and Harry Thornton, Jr.

MRS. DIXIE CHAMBERLAIN .- The real estate business, which has made such strides in development in this part of the country in the last decade, has proved a most attractive field of labor for the progressive business woman who recently has come to the fore and procured such good returns that her fellow workers are kept busy looking after their interests and keeping in close touch with her. Mrs. Chamberlain is a fine example of the energetic business woman and one who has been most prosperous in all her ventures. She has been optimistic at all times as to the future of Eureka and is the owner of several pieces of valuable real estate, numbering among her pos- sessions attractive flats on the corner of Third and I streets. She is the granddaughter of Jacob Shaw, a native of Maryland, and a Revolutionary soldier. He came of sturdy German stock and was one of the early settlers of Kentucky. Later in life he removed with his family to Arkansas, where he resided until his death. His wife was Elizabeth Hereford, of English descent.

Thomas J. Shaw, the father of Mrs. Chamberlain, was born in 1801, near Louisville, Ky., and it was there he was married to Eliza A. Brice, also a native of Kentucky, having been born in Clark county, in 1811. The father of Mrs. Shaw was Thomas Brice, likewise of Kentucky birth and a soldier in the war of 1812. He was of English descent and one of that class of citizens to whose energy and wise discrimination Kentucky is so greatly indebted. Thomas Brice was married to Margaret McMillan, a daughter of the Blue Grass State, and whose father, Maj. Robert McMillan, served in the Revolu- tionary War with the commission of major. His advent into Kentucky was during the time of Daniel Boone. Thomas J. Shaw, after a residence of several years in Center Point, Iowa, removed in the '50s to Linn county, Kan., making his home for four years at Mound City, which was only one mile from the old John Brown Fort. Returning with his family to Iowa, he continued to reside there until 1865, when the trip to California was begun. George Shaw, a son, who had crossed the plains to the Golden State in 1852, returned at that time and acted as captain of the large train which had been made up for the trip. For five months they risked their lives on the trackless, Indian-infested plains and only escaped a planned massacre by the soldiers of Fort Laramie surprising the red men at their place of ambush and routing them. In October, 1865, the little company arrived in Napa, Cal., and there the Shaws lived for a year, when they came to Humboldt county. More than

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any state in the Union, the vigorous prosperity of California is directly trace- able to the sturdy characters and untiring perseverance of its pioneers, bring- ing hither eastern conservatism and practical experience to the aid of western chaos and impetuosity, and enrolled among these noble men is the name of Thomas J. Shaw. He passed away in Humboldt county in 1879, while the mother lived until 1888. They were the parents of eleven children, of whom Margaret, Mrs. Congdon, makes her home at Center Point, Iowa; Ann, Mrs. Carlin, died while a resident of Center Point; George, who became prominent in the general affairs of Humboldt county and served as assessor for two terms, passed away while making his home in Eureka; James, another son, lives at Emeryville, Cal .; John and Francis are next in order; Dixie is the subject of this sketch ; Corinno, Mrs. Lambert, died at Eureka, while Jacob's demise occurred at Kneeland Prairie; Fronie makes her home on Albee street, Eureka ; Elton A., Mrs. Ogden, resides in San Francisco.

Mrs. Chamberlain was christened Sarah Helen, but was always called Dick until the war, when she was called Dixie, by which name she has been known ever since. She was born at Center Point, Linn county, Iowa, and it was there she received her education in the public schools. She accompanied her parents on the trip to California and two years after arriving here was married, October 21, 1867, at Elk River, to Joseph Scott Stewart. He was born at Crawfordsville, Ind., in 1832, and when he was a child he removed to Center Point, Iowa, with his parents. In 1853 he removed with his family to Puget Sound, Wash., and while there served in the Indian wars. Later he took up his residence in San Francisco and afterward located at Vallejo. In 1865, in company with George and Frank Shaw, Mr. Stewart came to Humboldt county and purchased the old Colonel Hagen ranch of about five hundred acres, and while living here was married to Dixie Shaw. They made their home on this valuable property until 1879, when they disposed of the ranch and took up unimproved land, further up the Elk river. Mr. Stewart had just begun the work of clearing and improving, when he contracted pneu- monia, and died July 27, 1880. He was a member of Humboldt Lodge No. 79, F. & A. M., and served his community as deputy assessor. Of the seven children born to Mr. and Mrs. Stewart, Cleo Gustein died in infancy ; Carl Veré is a clerk in the Mare Island Navy yard at Vallejo; Blanch Gertrude died when in her eighteenth year, a short time before graduating from the academy ; Ralph Scott is employed as a machinist with the Hammond Lumber Company, of Eureka ; Mark Clifford died in infancy ; Madge Myrtle, a short- hand reporter, died when twenty-two years of age; Dixie Corinno is the wife of Oscar Samuels, a prominent attorney of San Francisco.

In 1890 Mrs. Stewart became the wife of J. D. H. Chamberlain, a native of New York state, and for many years one of the leading attorneys of Eureka. Since his demise, which occurred in 1902, she has continued to make her home on I street. The five hundred acres of redwood timber land which she owned was later sold and investments made in Eureka business property, which she manages wisely and with profit. Fraternally Mrs. Chamberlain is a member of the Eastern Star ; is past officer of the Pythian Sisters; served as deputy grand chief of Humboldt county and grand manager of the grand Temple of California. She is likewise a prominent member of the Society of Humboldt County Pioneers, and politically an ardent Republican.

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CAPT. HENRY HAMILTON COUSINS .- Coming from the maritime county of Hancock in Maine, where a large proportion of the population from the earliest American occupancy up to the present generation have followed the sea for a livelihood, it is but natural that Capt. Henry Hamilton Cousins as well as his father, Capt. Jacob Cousins, should have devoted themselves to seafaring pursuits. The latter began to follow the sea when sixteen years of age; the former was only seven years old when he came to California from Maine in the brig Josephine around Cape Horn with his father, and in that long, tedious voyage upon the high seas began his lifelong affection for the deep, his intelligent interest in the mastery of an ocean vessel. The expira- tion of the voyage brought him to Eureka and this city he since has con- sidered his home, although the duties of his occupation frequently have taken him to other parts of the west and to other seaports of the Pacific ocean. As early as 1848 his father came to San Francisco as master of a vessel. Return- ing to the east in 1853, he made his next trip around the Horn in 1862, in which year he anchored the brig Josephine in the harbor of San Francisco. During the following year he came to Eureka in command of the brig Glencoe, owned by the Dolbeer & Carson Company. For many years he sailed from Eureka as master of ships and to this harbor in 1870 he brought the Wash- ington Libby, one thousand tons, which had the distinction of being the first ship of that size to cross the bar. He had the further honor of sailing the first boat up the Eel river. With his passing in 1885 there came to an end a long and prominent connection with the maritime development of Hum- boldt county.

For many years Capt. Henry Hamilton Cousins sailed with his father. The experience and calm judgment of the elder captain proved valuable to the younger man when later he came into the command of ships for himself. By training as well as native endowments he is well qualified for the life he has chosen. During 1905 he organized the Humboldt Stevedore Company, of which he was the first and only superintendent. Since 1906 he has been at the head of the Cousins Launch and Lighter Company, an organization whose inception he not only fostered, but which he owns, and whose upbuild- ing he promoted. In addition to other important duties he served for eight years as a member of the harbor commission, an important work for which his experience admirably qualified him. He has been twice married. All of his children were born of his first marriage. One, Ellen H., is deceased, and four are living, namely : Henry G., Mrs. Edna J. Phillips, Gilbert W. and Willard W. Notwithstanding his remarkably active life, with its occasional dangers and its frequent vicissitudes, he retains the enterprise of his earlier years, a forceful personality and vigorous temperament enabling him to maintain business relations of importance and even to enlarge the measure of his interests. Progressive in citizenship, he favors movements for the benefit of his home city and county, and is a warm advocate of every beneficial project.

JAMES BOYCE .- The Humboldt county hospital, of which Mr. Boyce has been the superintendent since 1910, has an established' reputation for scientific care given to inmates and skilled supervision given to the adjacent tract of vegetable, fruit and hay land. Although the original structure, con- sisting of main building and two wings, was erected in 1890, it has been so well maintained that it creates an impression of twentieth-century modernity, and its strong, substantial lines indicate efficiency as well as attractive type

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of architecture. Among similar institutions in the state it stands first in every department. The surgical ward and operating room are modern in construc- tion and equipment, the drug store carries a full line of drugs for the filling of all prescriptions, the halls are wide and airy, the rooms large and well ventilated. The water system includes an electric deep-well pump, an electric fire pump affording exceptional fire protection and a storage tank with a capacity of twenty-three thousand gallons. A large laundry affords the best facilities for all the work of the institution and there is also a steam-heating plant of sufficient size to heat the entire building. Besides the main hospital there are two cottages for tubercular patients and a detention home for unruly children. The grounds, twenty acres in extent, have been beautified in front of the hospital by planting trees, putting in a lawn and walks, and setting out shrubs and rose bushes. From the meadow in the rear are cut annually about twenty-five tons of clover hay and eight tons of oat hay, this being used for the horses and the six Jersey cows kept on the farm. Hogs also are raised in small numbers, while berries and vegetables are raised for the use of the hospital. The capacity of the institution is one hundred inmates. So far as possible they are taught the value of self-help and are asked to care for their beds and rooms and assist as able in the lighter work of the farm. Each Sunday services are held and during the week lectures are occasionally given, while other forms of entertainment are provided when practicable. The present superintendent has installed a new system of bookkeeping which enables him to tell at any time the exact financial standing of the hospital as well as the cost of any article large or small.

The superintendent of the hospital was born in Dunlopsville, Union county, Ind., November 10, 1861, and passed the years of boyhood in New York City, whence in 1882 he came to California. After one year in Del Norte county he came to the Eel river district in Humboldt county and here helped to erect one of the first creameries, being himself one of the pioneers in the creamery business in the valley. For seven years he engaged in farming in Santa Barbara county, after which he returned to Del Norte county and devoted four years to ranching. Since 1910 he has been superintendent of the Humboldt county hospital at Eureka and has brought to bear intelligent supervision and wise management, so that the hospital stands on a par with similar institutions in the state. Fraternally he is a member of Eureka Lodge No. 652, B. P. O. E. Since coming to this county he has purchased valuable redwood timber and these lands represent an investment of considerable magnitude and growing importance. Through his marriage to Miss Maude Deo, a native of Illinois, he is the father of two children, namely : Beryel, who married Augusta Maxwell, and has one child; and Mabel, who married P. A. Guyot, and has three children.

THOMAS M. BROWN .- From the earliest colonization of the Atlantic seaboard to the pioneer development of the extreme west successive genera- tions of the Brown family bore a part in the transformation of the frontier into fertile fields and productive farms. The first to take up the westward march, Josiah Brown, was born, reared and married in South Carolina, but became a pioneer of Kentucky during 1806. Daniel Boone and a few sturdy frontiers- men had preceded him and were endeavoring to hold their ground in the midst of savage Indians. Driven by fear of the Indians, he took his family to Tennessee in 1808 and remained there for twenty years, engaged in pioneer

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agriculture. When he took up government land in Illinois in 1828 McLean county, where he settled, was still in its infancy as an agricultural center, its resources undeveloped and its riches of soil unknown. There Josiah Brown died at the age of fifty years.

During the brief sojourn of the family in Kentucky, John W., son of Josiah Brown, was born in 1807, but practically all of his young life was passed in Tennessee, where he married Rachel Allen, a native of Overton county, that state. Accompanied by his family, in 1829 he joined his father in Illinois and two years later enlisted in the army for the Black Hawk war. At the close of that struggle he returned to his McLean county homestead, but in 1841 he moved his family to Missouri and settled in what is now Har- rison county. Upon the organization of the county in 1846 he was elected the first sheriff. For twenty successive years he held the offices of county and circuit clerk. When the little town of Bethany (the county seat) was started a mile from his farm he was chosen the first postmaster, and with the help of his son, Thomas M., cut down the timber on what was to be the main street of the village. During the Civil war so many people were in financial trouble that, with customary generosity, he aided them by buying their land or becoming security on their notes, and as a result he became encumbered hint- self and never retrieved his fortunes. In 1847 his wife had died, leaving him with a large family, of whom the eldest, Thomas M., was born in Overton county, Tenn., January 26, 1829, and was eighteen at the death of the mother. The family were earnest members of the Christian Church and possessed the moral and religious stability characteristic of practically the entire pioneer element of our country. When the father died in 1873 at the age of sixty-six he was mourned throughout the entire county of his residence.

Two years after the death of his mother Thomas M. Brown left home in company with five other young men bound for California. They traveled by the old Sublett cutoff and the Truckee route. On the 22d of September they arrived at Steep Hollow, Nevada county, Cal., and the next month they camped near Sacramento, whence Mr. Brown went to Stockton and thence to Jamestown, Tuolumne county. No success rewarded his efforts as a miner. In February, 1850, still in company with his friends, he bought four yoke of oxen and a wagon and drove to Trinity county, where their oxen were wounded by arrows shot by the Indians and injured so seriously that it was necessary to kill them. Next Mr. Brown joined a company of sixteen men who tried to dam the river at Ounce bar, for the purpose of working the bed of the stream, but the plan failed and those interested lost all they had. As an example of the prices of that period, it may be stated that Mr. Brown paid $4 for a paper of common tacks. In October, 1850, he moved to Weaverville, where he and another man took a contract to build a log cabin. Afterward he drove oxen, then bought an outfit of his own and also mined to some extent. In the fall of 1851 he went to Oregon gulch. A few months later he had a disastrous mining experience on French corral in Nevada county. Buying a store and hotel on the east fork of Salmon river in Klamath county, he spent several years there. In May, 1857, he was appointed deputy sheriff of Klamath county, his duty being to collect taxes from foreign miners.

After an absence from Missouri of eight years Mr. Brown returned home in the fall of 1858, traveling on the steamer Sonora to Panama, on the Aspinwall to Havana and on the Philadelphia to New Orleans, where he took

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a river boat to Cairo, Ill., and from there finished the journey by stage. In 1860 he came across the plains accompanied by his family and worked at Orleans bar during the winter of 1860-61. In the fall of 1861 he was elected sheriff and continued as such until Klamath was disorganized, a part of it being absorbed by Humboldt county. In 1869 he again became interested in mining and was the sole owner of a large property on which he built a five- mile ditch and a sawmill, but the enterprise proved his financial ruin. After three years of vacation from the office of sheriff, in 1877 he was elected sheriff of Humboldt county. Eleven elections were held from that time until his death in 1907 and each time he was chosen to the same office, in which he proved exceedingly efficient, fearless and acceptable. In addition he served for eleven years as tax collector. His wife, Surrilda J. (Poynter) Brown, was born in Kentucky in 1831, and was reared in Illinois. Their marriage occurred in Missouri in 1847. The wife died about a year before the husband, and they are survived by a daughter, Martha Jane, wife of Henry B. Hitchings, of Eureka. Fraternally he was a Mason, Odd Fellow and Elk.

MARTIN T. WADDINGTON .- California has always been proud of her loyal, native-born sons and among them is Mr. Waddington, who was born in Waddington, Humboldt county, February 29, 1884, and is the son of Alexander Waddington, a native of Blackburn, Lancashire county, Eng- land, having been born there in 1844. He attended the public schools of that county and later engaged as weaver in the woolen mills of Blackburn. At the age of eighteen he decided to come to the United States and he then located in Michigan, where he engaged in the lumber business for a few years, leaving there to come to California in 1867. Locating in Humboldt county, he homesteaded on a claim of eighty acres in the Eel river valley, where the store now stands. This claim was all unimproved, being covered with a heavy growth of underbrush and timber, but he commenced the clear- ing of it and at last put it into shape for farming and the building of his home. In 1894 he opened a small merchandise store on the home place and soon built up a good trade. This is the same fine store that the son has active charge of today. He also engaged in dairying for a short time, but the business of the store grew to such an extent that he was obliged to give up his farming interests and devote all his time to the store. He actively managed the business until 1906, when he retired to a well-earned rest, leav- ing the management of his affairs in the capable hands of his son Martin. He then moved to San Jose and there died in 1910. He was also interested in a stock ranch in Garberville and was always active in all political affairs of his county, and the postoffice, on the home place in the store, was named after him, Waddington. He was an active, industrious man and one who was well liked by every one in the community. He was a member of the Blue Lodge, F. & A. M. He was married in Eureka, May 14, 1883, to Julia A. Branstetter, a native of Humboldt county, and she still resides on the home ranch with her son. Martin T. attended the schools of the Coffee Creek dis- trict until he was fifteen years of age, at which time he entered the store to help his father. Ile has followed the general merchandise business ever since and has been very successful. He is a member of the Blue Lodge, F. & A. M., and the Royal Arch of Ferndale, B. P. O. E. and I. O. O. F. of Eureka. He was married January 20, 1912, to Enid Hindley, also a native of the county, and they have one child, Audrey.

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THOMAS BAIRD .- The life which this narrative delineates began at Chipman, Queens county, New Brunswick, October 31, 1835, and closed in Humboldt county, Cal., February 22, 1908. Between these two dates there was an era of great activity, whose identification with California began with the arrival of Mr. Baird in San Francisco during 1858. Hearing of an oppor- tunity to secure employment in the sawmills and logging camps of Hum- boldt county, he determined to come hither. An attack of typhoid fever had left him emaciated and enfeebled and in no condition for further occan travel, but he boarded one of the vessels plying the waters along the coast country and at Trinidad (the customary landing place of that period) he was transferred to a surf-boat, from which he was washed out upon the beach and tossed to and fro by the waves. It was not until he had been washed upon the beach four times and then rolled back upon the breast of the angry surf that he was rescued by the men on the shore and taken to a house, unconscious and more dead than alive. When able to work he secured employment in the sawmill of John Vance in Eureka. Next he worked at a logging camp in Ryan slough.

As a partner of Allen McKay, David Evans and other men, familiar with the logging and milling business, Mr. Baird bought from the original firm of Duff & Ryan the plant now known as the Occidental mill. After having continued in the business until 1871 he disposed of his interest and formed a partnership with the late John M. Vance in the commission business, fitting up a wharf and warehouse at the foot of F street. During 1884 he purchased the water front property at the foot of E street since known as Baird's wharf, and to this he removed his warehouse. The Baird wharves were the steam- ship landings for the city and Mr. Baird acted as agent for the original steamer, Humboldt, from the time the vessel was built until it was lost near Point Gorda in 1895. After Eugene Woodin in 1901 had purchased his wharf property, which is now used by the North Pacific Steamship Company, he devoted his attention to an oversight of his property interests in the city and country. Besides land on Maple creek he owned a tract of one thousand acres on the Arcata road near the tannery and on that great ranch stood a shingle mill which he operated for some years. Fraternally he held member- ship with the Humboldt Lodge No. 77, of Odd Fellows, Mount Zion Encamp- ment and the Veteran Odd Fellows Association. In Humboldt county, April 12, 1866, he married Lydia T. Vance, also born in Chipman, N. B., a sister of the late John M. Vance; she died June 1, 1901, leaving two sons, John R. and C. Alvin.

JOHN ROBERT BAIRD .- The local freight and passenger agent of the Northwestern Pacific Railroad at Eureka, was born in this city April 29, 1868, the son of the late Thomas Baird, a pioneer of the county, also represented on this page. John R. received his education in the public schools, supple- mented by attendance at the Pacific Business College in San Francisco. After an association in the lumber business and transportation lines with his father, he succeeded the latter in 1894 as agent for the Humboldt Steam- ship Company and later for four years engaged as agent for the Pacific Coast Steamship Company. During 1901 he came into the employ of the Eel River and Eureka Railroad Company, now the Northwestern Pacific Railroad, as freight agent at Eureka, which position he has since filled with recognized efficiency, and in January, 1915, he was made the local freight

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History of Humboldt 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, Part 33

Author: Irvine, Leigh H. (Leigh Hadley), 1863-1942 Publication date: 1915 Publisher: Los Angeles, Historic Record Company Number of Pages: 1328

Author: Irvine, Leigh H. (Leigh Hadley), 1863-1942
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: Los Angeles, Historic Record Company
Number of Pages: 1328