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 96

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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average quantity required at the works is eighty cords weekly, and the diffi- culty of procuring enough to keep the works going is increasing steadily, the company being obliged to go farther and farther for the bark each year. More- over, the location to be cut over must be chosen in good time and all prepara- tions made, as the cutting has to be done at the proper season, after which the bark is cured and hauled to the sheds at Briceland to be stored ready for use. Fifty mules and horses are used in the woods, and a five-ton automobile truck supplements the teams in taking the finished product from the works to Shelter Cove, where it is loaded onto steamboats for shipment to San Francisco, being sent thence by river boat to Stockton. The extract company is subsidiary to the Wagner Leather Company, of Stockton, which uses all the extract made at the Briceland works. Mr. Cowen has proved to be the right man for his work, and his efficiency has increased as he has acquired familiarity with its details, his resource and ingenuity in making the best of every situation being no less remarkable than his strength and ener- getic disposition.

While his activities for several years have been devoted principally to the business of the extract company, Mr. Cowen has also looked after some private affairs and has taken part in the public affairs of his locality. He has made a number of good investments in stock range and timber lands in Humboldt county, having a half interest in two hundred forty acres of red- wood timber lands ; and also three hundred twenty acres of tanbark oak land, his wife owning a similar quantity.

For the last four years Mr. Cowen has been filling the office of justice of the peace in Briceland township, with office at Briceland, and his recent nomination for another term shows how well satisfied his fellow citizens have been with his services. He has every reason to be well pleased with his choice of a place to live and work. He found the opportunities he was seeking, and has proved himself worthy of them ; the change has brought him content- ment and prosperity, and he is repaying the community which held out these attractions, and made good, with citizenship of the highest order.

On May 12, 1896, Mr. Cowen was married at Ferndale, Humboldt county, to Miss Annie Miner, daughter of Allen Miner, a stock-raiser in Union and Mattole, where she was born. Mr. and Mrs. Cowen have two children, Edward Allen and Harry Miner. Mr. Cowen owns the comfortable little home at Briceland which they occupy.

Mr. Cowen was the first of his family to come to California, and he was sufficiently impressed with its advantages to encourage other members to follow him, his parents, two brothers and five sisters joining him here in 1898 ; the next year another sister came out. Politically he has always been a stanch Republican.

DAVID MURPHY .- Those were energetic pioneers in the old days who made the tedious journey to California across the plains in ox-wagons or by sailing-vessel around Cape Horn, either journey being attended by the many inconveniences of travel in early times, not to mention hardship and danger. The father of David Murphy, a rancher and bear-hunter of Blocksburg, Cal., was one of the settlers of this state who made the journey around the Cape. The elder David Murphy was born in the state of Ohio and was married in Missouri to Polly Ann Raglan, a native of that state, by whom he had ten children, the two oldest being born in Missouri, the others in California. In

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1856 the family came to California, where for three years they lived at Hydesville, and in April, 1873, settling near Blocksburg. The father then bought the Foster ranch where he devoted his time and energy to stock- raising, and died sixteen years ago at the age of seventy-six, his wife having passed away the previous year aged sixty-five years.

The seventh of his children, David Murphy, now a prosperous resident of Humboldt county, was born at Cottonwood, Tehama county, Cal., October 10, 1867, receiving his education in the public schools of Blocksburg district, for some time remaining at home where he assisted his father and was em- ployed also on various other ranches in the vicinity. In 1890 he took up a pre- emption of forty acres which he proved up and still owns. He has also held large stock-ranch interests at Fruitland, Cal, which he sold in 1914 and rented the G. F. Connick ranch of fifteen hundred acres and about one thousand acres of Fruitland property whereon he raises cattle and hogs. Besides being a suc- cessful rancher, Mr. Murphy has gained for himself the distinction of being the most successful bear-hunter, at the present time, in the county, having killed twenty bears in Humboldt county during the season of 1913 and 1914, so that he may be said to rival Roosevelt as a bear-hunter. His reason for hunting so industriously was because the bears were destroying the hogs in the neighborhood.

Mr. Murphy's home life on his ranch is of the pleasantest. His wife is Susie F. Heryford, whom he married in 1891 ; she is the daughter of Paul and Josephine (Elkins) Heryford, also pioneers of California, crossing the plains when children; they were married in California; the father died in Blocks- burg and the mother now resides in Santa Rosa. Mrs. Murphy was born in Tehama, California, but was reared and educated at Blocksburg. She is the mother of five children: Viola, the wife of Bert Johnson, living near Harris ; Neta, the wife of Charles Flora, living at Fruitland; David, William and Eva.

JOHN WALTER RYAN .- Apparent chance brought Mr. Ryan from the extreme northeastern portion of our country (Sherman Mills, Aroostook county, Me.,) where he was born May 14, 1847, and where he had been reared on a farm, to the extreme western portion of our great continent, although there had been a long interval of employment in other sections prior to his settlement in Humboldt county in July of 1883. Throughout practically all of his life he has been identified with the lumber business. As a boy he worked in logging camps in the great pine forests of Maine. When he left that commonwealth in 1868 he secured employment in the lumber industry in Pennsylvania, nor was there any special change in occupation during the nine years of his wanderings in Idaho, Utah, Montana and Nevada. After he had engaged in the lumber business at Lake Tahoe for six years he spent two years in Butte City, Mont., until 1883, when he arrived in Humboldt county, where for eighteen years he was connected with the old Pacific Lumber Company of Scotia. For a time he also assisted in railroad building. During almost the entire period of his residence in this county he has been connected with its timber claims and perhaps no one is more familiar with their condition than he. Coming to Eureka in 1902, he bought the neat resi- dence which he now occupies. In 1905 he was appointed justice to fill a vacancy and the following year he was elected justice of the peace. Since then, a period of two terms, he has filled the office with rare tact and a far wider knowledge of the law than he would have been expected to possess.

John H. Ryani-

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Judge Ryan has always been a Republican, active in the councils of the party, and in 1900 was one of the state presidential electors on the Mckinley- Roosevelt ticket. He was duly elected and met with his colleagues in the senate chamber at Sacramento, when they cast their vote for the Republican nominees.

The first marriage of Judge Ryan united him with Miss Priscilla Mc- Henry, who was born in Pennsylvania and died in Humboldt county in 1900. Later he was united with Miss Minnie Jameson, who was born and reared in this county and is a member of an honored pioneer family, her father, Benja- min T. Jameson, having settled here in 1852 and afterward taken an active part in local upbuilding. Besides being prominent in the local branches of Masonry, including blue lodge, chapter, commandery and Eastern Star, in some of which he has filled offices of honor, Judge Ryan is one of the leading members of the Eureka Lodge of Elks and at this writing is serving as leading knight.

JAMES E. FRENCH .- The Ettersburg neighborhood is known as one of the most progressive in Humboldt county. The wholesome spirit of cooper- ation which has characterized that region is well exemplified in the success of the Ettersburg Farm Center, and the same liberal esprit de corps is evident in the business circles of the locality, where enterprise does not mean selfish- ness, or success riches for one man alone. The Etter brothers themselves have set a notable example in this regard, but those who have kept pace in their own lines also deserve and receive credit. As the Etters have taken the lead in Humboldt county in horticultural work, so the firm of French & Pixton has been foremost in another industry, one not yet thoroughly understood or entirely appreciated in this country-the raising of milch goats. The mem- bers of this firm are brothers-in-law, and they have been working together successfully for a number of years. Beginning in a humble way, taking up homesteads in the mountains which required years of hard work to prove up and develop, they have gone ahead in spite of drawbacks, and in their special line particularly have turned adverse circumstances to profitable use. In fact, one of their greatest triumphs is the demonstration that hundreds of acres of Humboldt county mountain lands hitherto considered useless for cultivation or grazing, being inaccessible even to sheep, may be turned to account.

Mr. French is a son of Daniel and Sarah (Huling) French, the father a native of Michigan and of English and German extraction. The mother came of an old English family, to which General Huling, a British officer in the Revolution, belonged. She was born in Iowa, and was only a child when taken across the plains by an uncle, the journey being made with ox teams, in 1861. After seven years' residence in California she returned to Iowa, where she married Mr. French in 1869, and in 1876 came back with him to California, settling that year near Fortuna, in Humboldt county. She died at Fortuna in 1895, the mother of three children: James E .; Ernest E., also a resident of the Ettersburg section of this county; and Clarence H. By a previous marriage Daniel French had one son, Henry, now a merchant in New York City. The father is still living, now (1914) almost eighty-four years of age, but though he lost his left leg nineteen years ago (it was ampu- tated above the knee) he is able to mount a horse and ride over the mountains unassisted.

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James E. French was born October 22, 1870, at West Union, in Fayette county, Iowa, and was six years old when his parents settled at Fortuna. There he received his education, graduating from the grammar school, and completed the ninth grade work when fifteen years old, after which he began to make his own living. For nearly two years he was in the employ of Cor- nelius Swett, butcher at Fortuna, driving a delivery wagon. Then he spent three years in Tillamook county, Oregon, where he took up a homestead, but he dropped it and engaged in the cattle business and eventually returned to Humboldt county. His next employment was with Z. B. Patrick, in the Ferndale market, and after two years he bought a third interest in the same. About this time he was married, and he continued in the meat business at that location until his wife's health made a change necessary, her suffering from asthma being relieved by the higher altitude at Ettersburg, which is in a mountainous region. For five years Mr. French rented a place at Ettersburg, the Erickson home, and then ran a hotel and conducted the post office for a time. He has homesteaded a tract of one hundred sixty acres on Wilder Ridge mountain, lying to the right of the road between Upper Mattole and Ettersburg, and though the third winter was very hard, many of his cattle being lost, he persevered until he proved up on his land, which has become more valuable yearly under his care. IIe still lives on that place, where he now has a comfortable dwelling house and barns, good fences, considerable cleared land and a fine family orchard; the corn he raises on his mountain tract is as fine and large as that grown anywhere.

But it is principally as a breeder of milch goats that Mr. French is working toward success. In partnership with his brother-in-law, Mr. Pixton, he has established what is now the leading business of the kind in Humboldt county, where Richard Sweasey, of Eureka, was the first to undertake it- that is, the first to introduce Toggenburg goats, a famous breed. French & Pixton were second, and at present they are giving more attention to the raising of Toggenburg goats than any others in the county. The work is so interesting that it is worthy of some mention. The Toggenburg goats are scarce and high priced, grade does bringing from fifty to seventy-five dollars, thoroughbreds from one hundred and thirty-five to two hundred dollars ; thoroughbred bucks are worth about three hundred dollars. Larger and stronger than the Angoras, they can climb where even sheep cannot go, and like homing pigeons return at night and at milking time. To those familiar with the mountain districts of California the breeding of these animals offers lucrative employment, and there is no danger of overstocking north- ern California in twenty-five years. Indeed, when the value of these little animals comes to be more generally known the demand for their products will increase. Their browsing habits make them almost invaluable in clearing land of brush, etc. The milk is prescribed by physicians for invalids and infants, and is claimed to be more digestible than cow's milk. Sold to hos- pitals, it brings twenty-five cents a quart. Condensed or evaporated, it may be kept almost indefinitely. It is the basis for the manufacture of Roquefort cheese, a high-priced commodity. The meat is good for food, by many pre- ferred to mutton, which it closely resembles. The hides are valuable for leather. Though the goat costs as much as a cow it can be raised in a much shorter time and for less than one-third the cost. French & Pixton now own five seven-eighths bred does, six three-quarter bred does, ten half-breed does

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plant and put in 3,000,000 bricks. The panic and the war caused him to lose everything that he had there, and in 1908 he returned to Louisiana and started anew. After a short stay in Louisiana he came to California, arriving in Scotia June 3, 1909, where he has since resided.

Both Mr. and Mrs. Marshall have many friends at Scotia and take an active part in the social life of the town. They have one child, Ben B. Marshall, born at Madria, Mexico, August 16, 1908. Mr. Marshall takes an interest in the local fraternal affairs, being a member of the Red Men at Scotia, Weeott Tribe No. 147, I. O. R. M., and also a Mason, with a membership in Eel River Lodge No. 147, F. & A. M., at Fortuna. He is a member of the Span- ish-American War Veterans, Camp Lafferty, P. I. In his political preferences he is a stanch Republican, and has served on the County Central Committee with distinction. He served as deputy sheriff under Redmond and at the No- vember election, 1914, he was elected constable of Hydesville township by a large majority, which position he is now filling. He is progressive and wide awake to the best interests of the community, giving freely of his time and ability for the general welfare. He believes in educational advancement, and lends his aid readily to all forward movements.

ARTEMUS HOWARD LEWIS .- Having traveled extensively over the west and south, being in all the Pacific coast states, Colorado, Arizona, Arkansas, Texas and New Mexico, and having lived many years in Missouri and Indiana, his native state, and also in Kentucky, A. H. Lewis returned at last to California and located on his present ranch in the Bull creek district, Humboldt county, in 1891, and is convinced that he selected for his home the garden spot of the United States, if not of the world, although he is loath to admit even the remote possibility of any place that excels his home community. Mr. Lewis is a native of Park county, Ind., born December 11, 1845. His father, George Ashford Lewis, was a native of Ohio, as was also his mother, who was Mary Hamilton in the days of her maidenhood. The father was a stone-mason and brick-layer, learning his trade at Pittsburg, Pa., and later becoming a contractor and builder well known in Indiana and Ohio. One of his most notable buildings was the court house at Craw- fordsville, Ind. In the fall of 1865 the family removed to Lawrence, Kansas, where the father died in the fall of 1866, at the age of fifty-four years. The mother returned to Paris, Monroe county, Missouri, where the son, A. H. Lewis, purchased a farm for her to reside upon, and there she lived until the time of her death, which occurred when she was sixty-seven years of age. She was the mother of eleven children, of whom tlte subject of this sketch was the second born.

A. H. Lewis was reared and educated in Indiana, spending most of his time at Rockville, Park county. He suffered from a peculiar affliction in childhood, being deaf from the time he was three years of age until he was fourteen, when the deafness left him as miraculously as it had come upon him. This affliction prevented him from indulging in the sports of other children, or the occupations of the farm, and he was obliged to spend his time at home with his mother. From her he learned to be an excellent cook, an accomplishment which he later used to good advantage. At a later date the family migrated to Lawrence, Kansas, making the journey with horses and wagons. Mr. Lewis soon came on westward, locating in Colorado, where he took a contract for the getting out of railroad ties for the Denver and Rio

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Grande Railroad, near Buena Vista and Salida. He made a great success of this undertaking, getting out many thousands of ties, and at the same time being engaged in cooking at a camp for about eight men; the double revenue netting him a handsome profit. Later he was employed as cook at the coke ovens, in Tincup or Virginia City, Colo., where he cooked for from thirty to forty men. Finally he returned to Missouri, but found the climate too cold to suit him, and so he came west again, this time through the Southwest. He was variously employed at the various places in Arkansas, Texas, New Mex- ico, Arizona and California for a number of years, including Sonoma county, Cal., where he worked for a year ; Seattle, Tacoma, Anacortes, and Kirkland, Wash., and Portland, Ore. He also spent a year in Humboldt county at this time, being engaged as cook for John French, in the lumber camps. From Washington he went through Idaho and Montana, back to Missouri, where he worked at contracting for four months, and eventually returned to Hum- boldt county, in April, 1890, where he has since made his home. He pur- chased his present place of one hundred fifty-four acres of James Hart for $1200 in 1890, and has improved it and greatly enhanced its value since that time, having orchards of apples, pears, peaches, prunes and plums.

The marriage of Mr. Lewis and Miss Sarah Reed took place at Lawrence, Kansas, in 1873, and of their union were born four children, only one of whom, Abner Bruce, is now living. He is an orchardist and stockman on Bull creek, and is married to Ida May Turner, a daughter of the late Noah H. Turner, a pioneer of Humboldt county. Mrs. Lewis is also the sister of Jasper Turner, a prominent young farmer and orchardist of the Bull Creek district, whose sketch appears elsewhere in this edition.

Mr. and Mrs. Abner Bruce Lewis have become the parents of seven children, namely, Ernest, Viola, Noah, Emma, Leona, Blanche and Bruce. Of the four children born to Mr. and Mrs. A. H. Lewis but one other lived to grow to maturity, this being a daughter, Effie Grace, who married Mr. Thompson, a conductor on a train running out of Leadville, Colo., where they made their home for many years. She died in 1912, leaving two children, Bruce and Albert.

Mr. Lewis was a sufferer from cancer for many years, and spent many months in various hospitals, and was pronounced incurable by many physi- cians. He was, however, entirely cured at the Bohanon Cancer Institute at Berkeley, and is a man of more than ordinary vitality, strong and capable of enduring great fatigue and hardship. He owned one hundred fifty-four acres of land here, but deeded ninety acres to his son Bruce. He resides in the oldest house on Bull creek, is still active and always busy in improving the place and in caring for his growing crops and orchards. He is one of the most enthusiastic boosters that Humboldt county possesses and his praises of the Bull creek country are quite unqualified. He is of a kindly, generous disposition and enjoys the friendship of a wide circle throughout this portion of the county.

MICHAEL RODONI .- Among the native sons who are making an honorable record and success in business in Humboldt county is Michael Rodoni, who was born in Salinas, Monterey county, August 29, 1877, the son of Michael and Constancia (Rosetti) Rodoni, natives of Biasca, Ticino, Switzerland. After their marriage they removed to Buenos Ayres, South America, where they engaged in the stock business for three years, when

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they returned to Ticino, and later they emigrated to Santa Cruz, California, in 1873, where the elder Rodoni followed teaming for about three years, after which the family removed to Arroyo Grande, San Luis Obispo county, where he purchased a ranch and engaged in dairying with success until he sold out and removed to San Jose, where he was a stock-buyer as well as buying and shipping hides. He was accidentally killed by being run over by a train at Twelfth and Taylor streets, San Jose, April 12, 1913, when he was seventy-two years of age. His widow still makes her home in San Jose. They had twelve children, ten of whom are living, as follows: Antone was born in Buenos Ayres ; Paul is the partner of our subject; Dora, Mrs. Monighetti, resides in San Luis Obispo county ; Michael, of whom we write: Jennie, Mrs. Robas- ciotti, of San Luis Obispo county; William, of Petrolia; Joseph died when twenty-eight years of age ; Josephine, Mrs. Garfinkle, of San Jose ; Fred, living at Capetown, and John, with Rodoni Brothers.

Michael Rodoni was reared on the farm in Arroyo Grande and received a good education in the public schools. In 1899 he came to Humboldt county and found employment at dairying at Loleta for three years, then at Ferndale for one year, when he became foreman of the Green Pond ranch for Z. Russ Company, continuing in that position for six years. Having determined to engage in business for himself he leased the Anderson place of eighty acres where he operated a dairy of forty cows for two years. After spending a year in the south, he returned to Humboldt county. In 1911 he formed the present partnership with his brother Paul, as Rodoni Bros., and leased the Grant Johnson place of fifteen hundred acres on Bear river, above Capetown, where they are engaged in dairying and stock-raising. Aside from raising cattle and hogs they have a dairy of sixty milch cows. They make butter which is made into squares and cubes and shipped to San Francisco under the brand of "Myrtle Grove Creamery." Their creamery is equipped with a gas engine for running the separator and churn.

Michael Rodoni was married in Ferndale to Miss Mary Jensen, a native of that place and a daughter of Robert Jensen, an old settler on the Island and who was accidentally killed by his horse running away. Mrs. Rodoni died near Ferndale, in 1907, leaving three children: Mabel, James and Ada. Fraternally he is a member of the I. O. O. F. and the W. O. W., at Loleta. Always interested in the cause of education, he is a loyal supporter of good schools. Politically he is a Republican.

Paul Rodoni, the other member of the firm of Rodoni Bros., was born in Biasca, Ticino, November 15, 1872, and came to Santa Cruz county. He grew up on his father's farm, remaining there until 1897, when he came to Loleta, Humboldt county. After working on dairy ranches he finally rented the Green Pond ranch for five years, and then ran a dairy, near Ferndale, for two years, until 1911, when he joined his brother Michael in the present enter- prise. By his marriage he has two children, Ernest and Elsie. He is a trustee of the Capetown school district and a Woodman of the World.

JACOB H. DECKER .- One of the oldest living pioneers of Humboldt county, Jacob H. Decker, whose death occurred December 14, 1914, was well past his eighty-first year. Mr. Decker was a veritable store-house of pioneer history, being probably the best informed man in the county on the early life of that section. His mind was as bright and his memory as vital as that of a man of fifty years, although his bodily strength failed during the past

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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 96

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