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 37

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

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JAMES AUGUSTUS HADLEY, M. D .- In the midst of the will-of-the- wisp allurements of far-distant fields it is seldom that a young man. selects for his permanent home the town of his nativity and the vicinity of his early educational training, but the choice of Dr. Hadley in selecting a suitable loca- tion for the practice of medicine brought him back to Arcata, where he was born October 3, 1884, and where his early education was obtained in the com- mon schools. The Doctor is a son of James L. and Elizabeth (Newsome) Hadley, natives respectively of Vermont and Canada, the former a pioneer of 1880 in Humboldt county, where he engaged in teaching in the Indian school at Orleans, continuing as a schoolmaster until ill health obliged him

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to relinquish active duties. The parents still make their home in Arcata.

It was through the influence of his brother-in-law, Dr. F. H. Bangs, that Dr. Hadley selected medicine as his preferred field of practice. Accordingly he directed his studies with that object in view. Largely through his own determined efforts and self-reliant industry he was enabled to take the com- plete course of lectures in the Cooper Medical College at San Francisco, from which he received the degree of M. D. in 1911. Returning to Arcata, he opened an office and began to devote himself to a general practice. From the first he has been successful. The fact that he has a personal reputation from childhood for integrity and high principles of honor has been of the utmost value to him in his professional affairs. During 1913 he erected on Sixteenth street a fine, modern hospital of fourteen beds, with full surgical equipment and all modern appliances, the institution being conducted under the title of the Hadley Sanitarium at Arcata. In 1914 he incorporated the Arcata Fraternal Hospital, of which he is president and manager, as well as medical director. By his marriage to Hildegard C. Ostermann, a native of Nevada City, Cal., he has two sons, George Gordon and Alvin Bruce. Besides being a member of the Humboldt County and California State Medical Associations, the Doctor acts as physician for the following orders at Arcata: Eagles, Red Men, Ancient Order of Foresters, Companions to the Order of Foresters, Woodmen of the World, Women of Woodcraft, U. P. E. C., I. D. E. S., and the National Croatian Society. The Doctor has his offices in the suite of rooms his brother-in-law, Dr. F. H. Bangs, occupied thirty years ago.

FLORENCE HENRY OTTMER, M. D .- It is the privilege of success- ful men to have a hobby aside from the specialty that forms a large part of their very existence, and Dr. Ottmer, in the midst of engrossing duties as a physician and surgeon at Eureka, is no exception to other professional lead- ers in having a line of recreation that gives him both work and refreshing change of occupation. Alvays a lover of animals, he has become an expert both with the gun and the fishing rod, and many of his vacations are spent in the woods or along the streams. As he wandered through fields and forests he came to observe and study the birds of Humboldt county, and this study led to the making of a collection which is now almost complete. His office possesses unusual interest, for in addition to the equipment to be found among the possessions of all modern physicians, there is also an exhibit of birds native to the county, as well as the skins of bears and other animals that have fallen beneath his unerring marksmanship. Almost every year he goes to the mountains for a bear hunt and, in the air of the forest and in search for game, he finds needed change from the arduous and at times exhausting duties of his profession.

A taste for materia medica and a love for the country come to Dr. Ottmer as an inheritance from his father, the late H. C. Ottmer, M. D., who was born, reared and educated in Germany, and was a graduate of the St. Louis Medical College in Missouri. For perhaps twenty-five years he engaged in practice in Warren county near Warrenton, Mo., and there his son, Florence Henry, was born December 4, 1861. Three other children were born of that marriage, his wife being Helen Archer, who was born in Missouri of Vir- ginian parentage. After her death, which occurred at the age of thirty-two, the Doctor married her sister, by which union he became the father of two children. During 1877 the family came to California. About eight miles from

2. Ottmer 8

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HISTORY OF HUMBOLDT COUNTY

Healdsburg in Sonoma county the Doctor bought a large fruit ranch on Dry creek and there he conducted extensive fruit enterprises with excellent results. Longevity was characteristic of his family, his father living to be ninety-five and his mother one hundred and three, while his own death occurred at the age of nearly eighty years.

It was not the wish of Dr. Henry C. Ottmer that his son, F. H., should enter the profession in which he himself had achieved noteworthy success, and his opposition to the plan was so great that he refused to pay the expenses of a medical education. With sturdy resolution of purpose, the young man set about carning his own way through college. After graduating from the State Normal School at San Jose he taught for two years at Bodega, Sonoma county, and then took the course of lectures in Cooper Medical College, San Francisco, from which he was graduated in 1887. A year was then spent in post-graduate work at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York City. On his return to California he began to practice in the southern part of Humboldt county, but in 1891 removed to Eureka, where since he has established an important practice, ranking as one of the foremost physicians of the city. His love of nature finds expression in the cultivation of a farm of one hundred sixty acres near Yuba City, Sutter county, which he is developing into a fruit farm, setting it out chiefly to peaches and almonds.

With his wife, who was Miss Annie Hutchinson, a native of Santa Rosa, this state, he shares in the good wishes of the people in every class of society and forms a distinct accession to the citizenship. Having no children of their own, they adopted two orphans, Alice E. and Esther M. For some time Dr. Ottmer officiated as president of the Gentlemen's Driving Club of Eureka. His fraternities are the Elks, Woodmen of the World and Red Men. Partisan- ship has not appealed to him in political issues and he maintains an inde- pendence of thought that finds expression in a ballot for such candidates as he deems best qualified to represent the people, irrespective of party ties. In his chosen field of professional labor he has been prospered and abundantly merits the prestige and popularity accorded him.

THOMAS CARR .- Nothing contributed to the American colonization of California in greater degree than the discovery of gold. In the years following that memorable occurrence men sought the Pacific coast from every section of the world, among these Argonauts being Thomas Carr, a native of Belfast, Ireland, and an immigrant to the United States in young manhood. Daily toil in Wisconsin brought him a livelihood, but nothing beyond a bare subsistence, so that he was eager to try his fortune in the great unknown region beyond the barren plains and desolate mountains. Nor did he have reason to regret the decision that made him a resident of California, for although he failed to find the hoped-for wealth in the mines and did not, in- deed, become very rich at any time or in any occupation, he made a com- fortable living and gained many warm, devoted friends in both Trinity and Humboldt counties.

After having made his home at Weaverville, Trinity county, from 1852 to 1868, in the latter year Mr. Carr removed to Humboldt county and settled in Eureka, where he was a pioneer carriage-maker. From that time until his death he was identified with the county seat. It was his good fortune to retain to the last his mental and physical faculties. His clear memory enabled him to recall many thrilling events of the '50s and frequently he narrated

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early happenings that had much to do with the shaping of ultimate achieve- ments in the west. Personally he possessed the ready wit of his race, the habit of viewing the world with a cheerful spirit and a keen humor from which his kind heart kept every trace of satire. While living in Trinity county he became a charter member of the North Star Lodge No. 61, I. O. O. F., and Stella Encampment No. 12, while later he identified himself with the Veteran Odd Fellows of Weaverville. Through his marriage to Anne Hodgins he became the father of five children, namely : Elizabeth H., Mary A., Emma G., Edward Baker and Kate L., Mrs. Harpst, of Eureka. The first-named makes her home with Mrs. Harpst, and the others are deceased.

ISAAC MINOR .- The president of the First National Bank of Arcata, which institution he organized and opened for business in October, 1913, is Mr. Minor, a pioneer of December, 1853, and through all the intervening years an associate in movements for the permanent upbuilding of Humboldt county. Whether the elements entering into his success were innate personal attributes or whether in part they were quickened by the circumstance of his early identification with California, it would be impossible to determine. Suffice it to know that he reached the success and that Humboldt county has been the center of his large enterprises. To him belongs the credit for the building of the Warren Creek standard-gauge railroad, which makes possible a convenient connection with the Northwestern Pacific Railroad. Also to him may be given credit for the development of a granite quarry near Arcata, a plant mining a fine quality of granite that splits like wood, but hardens when exposed to the air. Sawmills, creameries, electric lighting systems, freight vessels, timber lands and farms represent the varied character of his commercial connections and the remarkable change that has come into his life since he arrived in Arcata, friendless, without money or influence, and in the frontier environment of the then Uniontown, the original county seat of Humboldt county, took up the task of rising out of day labor into inde- pendence. How well he succeeded in reaching the goal of his ambitions is a matter of common knowledge throughout the entire county, whose resources have been developed under his sagacious supervision and whose opportunities he believes to be as great as those offered by any section of the state.

Descended in the third generation from Gen. Ephraim Douglas of Revo- lutionary war fame, Isaac Minor is a son of Samuel and Louise (Keller) Minor, natives respectively of New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and during early married life residents of the last-named state, where their son, whose name introduces this article, was born on a farm April 8, 1830. The wife and mother died in the Keystone state at forty years of age, and later the father became a pioneer of Iowa, where he spent his last days in the home of a daughter. During the fall of 1851 Isaac Minor came via Panama to California. The voyage up the Pacific to San Francisco on the old ship, Monumental City, consumed forty-nine days and was filled with peril. More than once the passengers had to take turns in pumping the water out of the unseaworthy craft. The vessel cast anchor in safety, but on its next voyage was lost. March of 1852 found Mr. Minor in Sacramento, where the great flood was in progress. All night he worked for $1 an hour, carrying off goods that were being destroyed by water. In the morning he waded out through the water and walked to Chinese Camp in Tuolumne county, where he spent eighteen months in prospecting and mining. Chance brought him to Humboldt county

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during the latter part of 1853. Being young, energetic and capable, he had no trouble in securing work, but his independence of spirit led him to prefer to work in his own interests rather than in the interests of others.

A store at Orleans bar on the Klamath river would have brought Mr. Minor large profit and permanent employment had it not been for the hostile Indians, who killed all of his neighbors and threatened his life, so that after two years at that place he was forced to leave. It was during the same period of Indian hostility that he became a warm friend of Ulysses S. Grant, then a lieutenant, who ten years later was one of the most distinguished figures in American military affairs and general of the entire army, but who at that time was unknown and obscure, stationed at Fort Humboldt to provide pro- tection for settlers against the Indians. For seven years Mr. Minor operated and owned a pack-train and sold goods at the mines, meanwhile meeting with many thrilling adventures. His savings were invested in a stock ranch at Camp Anderson on Redwood creek and he operated the property until the savages burned his buildings and killed a number of his neighbors. To guard against further depredations soldiers were stationed on the Minor ranch during the winter of 1859. When the troops left conditions remained quiet until 1863, when a further outbreak on the part of the Indians caused Mr. Minor to leave that district and to join his family at Arcata. At the beginning of the Indian war he owned one thousand head of cattle and at its close he scarcely had one hundred left, but even more disastrous was the damage done to buildings of his own and his neighbors, while the greatest disaster of all was in the loss of life, his brother, Samuel Minor, being among the many to fall victims to the hostility of the savages. When peace had descended upon the valley and peaceful vocations were once more possible, he bought one hundred and forty acres one mile from Arcata on the bottom land and there he lived for sixteen years, meanwhile not only farming but also building and operating two sawmills with Noah Falk as a partner. Next he built a mill at Warren creek four miles north of Arcata and operated it for fifteen years until the plant was burned to the ground. About 1885 he built the Glendale mill, from which power is furnished for the Blue Lake electric light system. About 1898 he built a creamery and other buildings on his ranch six miles north of Arcata and established a station which he named Mckinleyville. A corps of employes was put to work at the creamery, store, hotel and farm, as well as in the Glendale store and on the broad acres of timber land. About the beginning of the twentieth century he sold twenty-six thousand acres of redwood land in Del Norte county for $960,000, ten thousand acres in Law- rence creek in Humboldt county for $250,000, and three thousand acres on the north fork of Mad river for $180,000, and the money received from these sales he invested in fifteen thousand acres of sugar pine land fifteen miles from the Yosemite valley, considered the finest tract of such land in the entire state. This he afterwards sold at a good profit. However, he still retained four thousand acres of redwood timber, with mills for the sawing of the lumber, as well as one-fourth interest in five ships used for carrying lumber. and stock in the tugs used in towing vessels over the bar. Later on he turned the property, with mills and vessels, over to the children, who worked the timber all out. In 1914 Mr. Minor completed the Minor Theater, opposite the First National Bank Building. It is said to be the finest theater in the

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county, in fact as well equipped as any in the state, and he has also completed three store buildings adjoining it. This is now the best portion of the business section of the town.

Mr. Minor was married in Arcata to Hannah Caroline Nixon (a sister of William Nixon), who was born in Fayette county, Pa., December 28, 1839, and at the age of three years was taken to Iowa, coming in 1852 via Panama to California, where her marriage was solemnized December 20, 1855. Twelve children were born of the union, six of whom grew up, as follows: Theodore H. and Isaac N., who became capable assistants of their father in his large business operations, the former now an extensive oil operator in Bakersfield, and the latter owning the Glendale mill property, where he has a large dairy ; Mary E., Mrs. H. D. Pressey, of Petaluma, this state ; Bertha A., Mrs. L. D. Graeter, of Arcata: David K., who was also an assistant of his father, but now lives in Oakland : and Jessie Irene, Mrs. Waters, who resides in Santa Rosa. The mother of these children passed away in 1906, and in 1908 Mr. Minor was married to Miss Caroline Cropley, a native of Michigan. The Cropley family subsequently came to California and Mr. Cropley became proprietor of the tannery in Arcata. In regard to fraternities Mr. Minor has made no associations except with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. Politically he votes with the Republican party. His personal qualities as a man of sterling worth, together with his exceptional business qualifications, have given him prominence and prestige throughout the county where, after over sixty years of intimate identification, he is still in the forefront of financial, agricultural, logging, quarrying and railroad affairs, a man among men, and a citizen of whom his adopted county may well be proud.

FRANK W. DINSMORE .- The assistant secretary and local manager of the Mercer-Fraser Company at Eureka is a member of a Canadian family and claims New Brunswick as his native province, having been born in Charlotte county November 22, 1868. In the forests near his early home he learned the trade of a woodsman and became quite skilled in the use of the axe, so that he earned a fair livelihood while still a mere lad. In the meantime he received favorable reports concerning opportunities for work in the woods of Cali- fornia and for this reason was induced to come to Humboldt county, arriving at Eureka on the 1st of June, 1888. Immediately he began to work in the lumber woods adjacent to this town, continuing through a long period of efficient activity. Ilis fine qualities of head and heart had won the attention of the Mercer-Hodson Company and he was taken into their employ during 1901, remaining with the concern in the later change of title to the Mercer- Fraser Company. Through the purchase of stock in 1907 he became a partner in the company, with which he has since been identified as assistant secretary and manager. His rise from hardships, without influence except his own energy and perseverance, to an excellent position with an established con- cern, in which he is financially interested, proves him to be a man of force of character and energy of will. Fraternally he holds membership with Eureka Lodge No. 652, B. P. O. E., and Humboldt Lodge No. 77, I. O. O. F. By his marriage to Miss Jessie Gow, a native of Humboldt county and the daughter of a pioneer. he has three children, Laura, Theodore and Frances.

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ALBERT NATHAN HUNT .- Although not a native of California, Al- bert Nathan Hunt is a pioneer in the strictest sense of the word, coming to the mining districts in an early day, when he was but a lad, and spending his boyhood days so deep in the wildernesses of the California mountains that he was able to attend school but three years. In spite of this handicap, however, Mr. Hunt has prospered exceedingly in all his undertakings and is today a man of wealth and influence and an active power in his community for good. He has been associated with the most vital interests of Humboldt county for many years, and in Arcata where he resides, he is acknowledged to be one of the most progressive and broad-minded men of the thriving little city. He is interested in many enterprises, but his chief interest lies in real estate, farms, farming and cattle-raising being his principal investments, and today he owns and operates some of the finest and best improved properties in Humboldt county.

Mr. Hunt was born in Vinal Haven, Knox county, Me., September 30, 1857. His father was Hon. Fitz Albert Hunt, a stonemason by trade, and operated quarries, getting out stone for buildings and monuments; he also ran a farm. He lived in Maine all his life. For thirty-six years he held the office of justice of the peace in his township and later was assemblyman for many terms. The mother, Jane Calderwood, died when the present citizen of Arcata was but three weeks old, and when he was a lad of but a few years he was taken to be reared by an aunt and uncle, Mr. and Mrs. John Jayne, living in Washoe county, Nev. With these relatives he made his home from that time until he reached manhood's estate and started out in life for him- self. From Nevada he removed with Mr. and Mrs. Jayne, when he was still a small child, to California, about 1864, locating on Yuba river, Sierra county, six miles from Downieville, where the uncle was interested in mines.

When young Hunt was nine years old the family moved to Compton- ville, where he attended school for a few years, and later moved into a dis- trict where there were no schools within distance that he could attend. He remained on the farm working for and with his uncle until he was twenty-one, when he went to work on neighboring ranches, saving his earnings and giv- ing them to his uncle to apply on the payment of a loan on his ranch. Later he went to Pike City and worked for the Alaska Mining Company in their mines as a night watchman. After a year of this work the properties were destroyed by fire and while he was again looking for employment he received an offer to make posts and ties for the company. His brother-in-law, John Robertson, was engaged at that time contracting for the making of posts and ties, and Mr. Hunt determined to make a venture in the same field. Accordingly he secured the proffered work under contract, and not since he was nightwatchman at the mines has he ever worked for anyone or ever received a wage for his service, ever since working for himself.

For the next six years Mr. Hunt was successfully engaged in the making of posts and ties, under contracting arrangements, and succeeded in accumu- lating an appreciable sum of money. He was anxious to try his hand at farming and dairying, and also to establish for himself a permanent home. Accordingly, in 1887, he came to Humboldt county, for a short time being in Eureka, and all the while looking for a satisfactory opportunity to purchase land. He finally chose a forty-acre tract of Arcata bottom land, partly im- proved, which is now his home place. For this land he paid $100 per acre,

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the highest price paid up to that time, and he was thought to be very unwise, but the rise of land has been gradual and a twenty-acre tract adjoining his ranch has lately sold for $600 an acre. Here Mr. Hunt started in the dairy- ing business with four cows, making butter by hand, and selling it to private parties in town. The second year he increased his herd by the purchase of ten more cows, bought at intervals during the year. Now he has a splendid herd of forty-five picked milch cows, classed as one of the best in the valley.

When he first began dairying there was not a creamery in the valley, and Mr. Hunt was one of the founders of the first creamery built and was its first president, and managed it for four years. He gave his services with- out compensation, in order that the new enterprise might be made a success. This creamery was started in 1893 and was then called the Arcata Creamery No. 1, but is at present known as the United Creameries, Inc. Mr. Hunt was president and director of the company for four years, and its present success- ful business standing is largely due to his unselfish efforts. He is still a stockholder in the enterprise.

Mr. Hunt has continued to add to his real estate holdings, and is now one of the largest land owners in the county. About eight years after the purchase of the first tract he bought ten acres adjoining the home place on the north, paying $150 an acre, all of which was improved land. Two years later he added another tract of twenty acres on the south side of the home place, for which he paid $200, and still later bought eighty acres north of Mad river which has since been well improved, and another twenty acres has been added to it, making the ranch one hundred acres, this being in charge of his son, Herbert Hunt. The home place, and the later additions of acreage have been vastly improved by Mr. Hunt and brought under a high state of cultivation. He built a large barn and a commodious, modern residence in 1901, which are a credit to the community, and a monument to the thrift of the owner.

In 1906 Mr. Hunt made another notable addition to his holdings by the purchase of the Dr. Farrar ranch, six miles north of Bridgeville on the Van Dusen river. This ranch comprises some two thousand acres and is one of the most highly improved stock ranches in Humboldt county today. His son, Stanley A. Hunt, has charge of the place, which is devoted to raising cattle, sheep and hogs and livestock generally. Mr. Hunt now gives his attention to buying and selling, but makes a specialty of dealing in cattle, being one of the largest individual dealers in the county.

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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 37

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