History of Kern 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 125

Author: Morgan, Wallace Melvin, 1868- [from old catalog]
Publication date: 1914
Publisher: Los Angeles, Cal., Historic record company
Number of Pages: 1682

USA > California > Kern County > History of Kern 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 125

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Mr. Whitaker has a clear, active legal mind, and his tireless work, un- questioned integrity. courteous and affable manner, profound knowledge of law and his excellent business judgment have brought his success

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in abundant measure. He has the unqualified respect of court and bar alike, while he numbers among his clientele many of the leading corporations and oil companies known to Kern county. Although a clever criminal lawyer, his successful ventures in the oil business and his large clientele among oil men and financiers divert his time and efforts mainly to civil practice in which department he has become very proficient. Although a general prac- titioner, his corporation practice has become very large and he has in con- sequence reaped wealth in goodly measure. In his political views he holds steadfastly to the principles of the Republican party. At San Francisco in 1889 he was united in marriage to Miss Nettie M. Sisson, the niece of A. W. Sisson, late of the well-known constructing firm of Sisson, Crocker & Co., who won wide acquaintance as contractors on the Union Pacific and South- ern Pacific Railroads. Mr. Whitaker has abiding faith in the future of Bakersfield and Kern county.

PIERRE VILLARD .- After more than twenty-five years of industry as an employe of others or as the owner of a flock of sheep, eventually Mr. Villard was in a position to invest in a tract of Kern county's splendid irri- gated land and since then he has concentrated his attention upon the improve- ment of his farm.

A son of Pierre, Sr., a farmer in France, Pierre Villard, Jr., was born in Hautes Alpes April 19, 1862, and arrived in Kern county October 3, 1881. For many years he was engaged as herder for the flock owned by Peter Lam- bert, an influential stockman of that day. Meanwhile he made his headquar- ters at Sumner (now East Bakersfield). During 1898 he bought a small flock of sheep and for the next decade he gave his time largely to the care of the drove, ranging them in Kern, Inyo, Fresno or Tulare county as con- ditions directed or the necessities of pasturage rendered advisable. In 1907 he sold the sheep and invested the proceeds in the purchase of seventy-one acres on Brundage lane near Union avenue six miles south of Bakersfield. The land is under irrigation from the canal and is devoted to grain and al- falfa, besides being improved with family orchard and vineyard,. neat farm house and substantial barn. In Bakersfield, July 20, 1907, he married Miss Rose Grimaud, a native of Hautes Alpes, France, and they are the parents of two children, Peter and Rose. The family holds membership with St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church in East Bakersfield.

GEORGE W. KUEHN .- Shortly before the outbreak of the Civil war there came from Germany to the United States a young man named William Kuehn, a native of the vicinity of Hamburg and the possessor of very limited means, but of an excellent education in his native tongue. Settling in Penn- sylvania in 1861, he immediately enlisted as a private in Company E, Fifty- fifth Pennsylvania Infantry, and went to the front with his regiment, taking part in a number of important engagements. Three years of active service had been passed when he was seriously wounded at the battle of Drury's Bluff. The wound was so serious that the amputation of a leg was made imperative. For many months after the operation he was unable to work, but meanwhile he had received an honorable discharge from the army, and as soon as possible he entered a business college in Philadelphia, where he took a commercial course. Soon afterward he opened a lumber yard at Minersville, Schuylkill county, Pa., and there he remained in business until his final retirement at an advanced age. For almost thirty years he also served as the city justice of the peace. At Minersville, where he still makes his home, he married Alice Jones, who was born near that city, of Welsh parentage. Eight children were born of their union and seven are still living, George W. being next to the eldest of the number and a native of Minersville, born March 30, 1872.

Upon the completion of a high-school course in his native city Mr.

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Kuehn served an apprenticeship to the trade of moulder in Minersville. However, his tastes led him to a study of music rather than to the life of a tradesman. From childhood he had loved music and had displayed excep- tional ability in that art. This led to the taking up of its study at Dana's Musical Institute in Warren, Ohio, where he remained a student until he was graduated at the completion of the regular course. Meanwhile he had made a specialty of the piano and clarionet, in both of which he possesses exceptional proficiency. From 1898 until 1900 he engaged in orchestra work, traveling in different states and teaching students who had advanced beyond the rudiments of the profession. Meanwhile he had married at Warren, Ohio, Miss Effie Smith Pinkard, who was born in Illinois, but grew to womanhood in Ohio. The ill health of his wife caused him to leave the east in 1900, with the hope that she might be benefited by the sunny climate of California. It happened that he arrived on the coast shortly after oil had been discovered in the Kern river field. Emigration was turned to Kern county and he saw in Bakersfield an excellent field for his professional activi- ties. Accordingly he established a home here and began as an instructor of the piano, in which he has been successful from the start, being not only the pioneer piano teacher in the city, but one of the most prominent and popular. Kuehn's orchestra, the principal organization of the kind in Bakers- field, was started under his personal supervision and has been trained to a degree of professional skill apparent in its rendition of the most difficult compositions. The gratifying position held by the orchestra may be attrib- uted in large part to the painstaking and intelligent supervision of the leader, whose musical temperament enables him to guide the instruments with fine feeling and judicious restraint. Mr. Kuehn saw the possibilities of Bakers- field soon after he came and purchased the northwest corner of G and Twenty- first streets, where he built three substantial residences, one of which he occu- pies, and in another he has his studio.

Having given time and thought and attention very closely to professional duties, Mr. Kuehn has had neither the inclination nor the leisure for partici- pation in public affairs and indeed takes no part in such aside from casting a Republican ticket at national elections. Of the two daughters born of his marriage Margaret is the only survivor, Estella having died at the age of seven years. Both he and his wife hold membership in the Presbyterian Church and also are interested in the activities of the Women of Woodcraft, their membership in the same resulting from his association with the Wood- men of the World. In addition he has been identified for years with the Ancient Order of United Workmen.

STANISLAUS GRIMAUD .- Sturdy French ancestry has contributed to Stanislaus Grimaud that strength of character, firmness of purpose and shrewd business ability which has placed him among the most successful stockmen of Kern county. He was born December 13, 1854, in St. Bonnet, among the lofty Hautes Alpes, France, the son of an active and thrifty farmer of that place, Pierre Grimaud, who married Marie Boyer and became the father of eleven children of whom but two survive. The parents are both deceased.

Exceptional educational opportunities were those afforded to Mr. Gri- maud, his studies in the public schools being supplemented by a course at the college in Grenoble, and being naturally of quick mind and keen percep- tion he imbibed the principles of developing his intellect with such celerity that he was ready to face life's problems when still quite young. In No- vember, 1873, he left France for America with the intention of making Cali- fornia his destination, and coming via Havre and New York arrived in San Francisco January 10th, following. He immediately set to work to procure employment, and went to work in a coffee and spice factory for nine years. In 1882 he came to Delano, Kern county, to enter the employ of a sheep man, and two years later he bought a flock of fifteen hundred sheep and began to

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engage in that enterprise for himself, ranging his flocks around Delano and the mountains of Kern, Inyo and Mono counties. In 1892 he made a trip to his old home, his visit lengthening to fifteen months, when he returned to Kern county to resume his sheep business. In 1901 he sold his sheep and removed to Paulina, Crook county, Ore., where he again engaged in sheep raising, his flock numbering five thousand head, and he also had three hun- dred head of cattle. Deciding to return to Delano he sold his business in November, 1909, and upon arriving in Kern county bought a band of sheep and continued until 1912 in the sheep raising business, but then sold out. In January, 1913, he bought forty acres near the Kern Island road, seven miles south of Bakersfield, and engaged in dairying, which still is his busi- ness. All the land is under irrigation, and alfalfa and grain are raised in abundance. A large dairy herd is kept and the most excellent facilities used for the dairying.

Mr. Grimaud was married January 19, 1889, to Miss Rosine Borel, who was born in St. Laurent, Hautes Alpes, France, and came to California in 1888. Three children have come to this union, Emma, who was educated at St. Mary's Academy, The Dalles, Ore .; Stanislaus, who also attended St. Mary's ; and Adrien. Mr. Grimaud is Republican in his politics.

MAURICE NICOLAS .- The sterling integrity and honesty of purpose noticeable in every business transaction and in every association of life place Mr. Nicolas high among the French-American farmers of Kern county, while the possibilities offered by this county to such energetic, industrious farmers as he, find illustration in the growing success attendant upon his labors. In the early period of his residence in America he made Minnesota his home, but the rigorous climate and the lack of satisfactory returns from the cultivation of the soil led him to dispose of his stock and implements there and direct his activities toward work in the far west. In coming to this country, a lad of only sixteen, unfamiliar with the English language or the conditions of life in the new world, he had the advantage of being directed and advised by uncles, a number of whom had come to this country in preceding years. His parents, Joachim and Anna (André) Nicolas, were lifelong residents of France, where the mother died in 1874 and the father in 1897, the latter having devoted all of his life to agricultural pursuits in his native province. There were three children in this family and the second of these, Maurice, was born at the old homestead in Hautes Alpes February 16, 1869, and alternated his time in youth between the country schools and the usual routine of farm work. As previously stated, he was only sixteen when he cast in his fortunes with the possibilities of the new world. Two uncles, Frank André and Father Jean André, had settled in Minnesota and in 1885 he joined them in Renville county, where he worked for wages on a farm.

Perhaps a year after his arrival in this country Mr. Nicolas began to operate land as a renter, an uncle having established him on his own farm, where he learned agricultural affairs as conducted in that part of the world. The farm was under cultivation principally to wheat, but other products also were raised. In 1891 the young tenant sold off his implements and stock and came to Los Angeles, where he entered the employ of a brother-in-law, André André, a large sheepman owning flocks in the mountains and on the range not far from that city, and mentioned elsewhere in this volume. Dur- ing 1894 the sheep were brought to Kern county in order to have the advant- age of the excellent pasturage afforded by this section of the state. Here, as in Los Angeles county, Mr. Nicolas was given charge of the stock, which thrived under his efficient oversight. Finding the industry interesting and profitable, in 1900 he bought a flock and entered into partnership with Mr. André, ranging the large flock in Kern, Tulare and Inyo counties. After some years of personal ownership of a flock in 1906 he sold the sheep, with-

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drew from the partnership and gave himself the merited enjoyment of a trip back to France, where he spent four months in visiting the scenes familiar to his youth and renewing acquaintanceship with kindred and boyhood friends. Upon his return to Bakersfield he bought forty acres on Union avenue five miles south of the city, under irrigation from the central branch of the Kern Island canal, and well adapted to the raising of grain and alfalfa, which are the principal products of the farm and form the leading and re- munerative activities of the thrifty owner. He is a Republican in politics.

PHILIP WINSER .- Descended from an old and honored family of Kent, England, Mr. Winser was born near Tenterden, October 29, 1863, a son of Albert and Mary J. (Beaufoy) Winser, natives respectively of Kent and Norfolk. The latter passed away in 1908; the former, hale and rugged for one of eighty-one years, is now living retired at his country home, Rats- berry. The family consisted of ten children, but of these Philip was the only one to seek a location in California and it was during 1891, after he had finished his education in different English schools and had followed farming in his native shire for fifteen years, that he became a resident of Tulare county, having joined the Kaweah Co-operative colony, of which he was elected a trustee. While the colony did not prove to be a financial suc- cess, he had learned much concerning the soil and its needs during the period of his experimental work as a colonist. Such lessons brought later returns of great value. Having purchased and cleared a tract of land on the North Fork of Kaweah, he joined with a few neighbors in building a ditch for irri- gation and then planted an apple orchard. For a time he got some returns by selling grafted nursery stock. Before he had received any returns from the land he worked in the employ of others in order to meet expenses of a livelihood and of the improvement of the tract.

When finally the apple trees came into full bearing Mr. Winser found that he had more than could be sold in his regular trips among the residents of near-by towns. Exeter, Hanford and Visalia furnished him with excel- lent markets during the first year of his sales. Meanwhile he had heard much concerning Bakersfield and in October of 1904 he hauled a load across the country to this city. Immediate sale was made at a fair price. Return- ing home, he loaded and shipped a car to this place, but the apples having been put in the car loose arrived in poor condition and scarcely paid ex- penses. Quick to learn the lesson, he carefully packed his next consignment in boxes loaded with care, then shipped his car, which arrived intact. Mean- while he had received favorable mention for his fruit and twice had been awarded medals for his apple exhibit at the Central California fair. For three winters he and his wife spent about three months in Bakersfield, hand- ling and selling their shipments from the ranch. During 1906 they erected a house at No. 216 Twenty-second street, but later they bought a lot and built a comfortable home at No. 200 Twenty-second street, where they have since resided.

For the convenience of the handling of the products of his farm Mr. Winser has built two cellars with a capacity of twenty-five tons, and he is now in a position, through the running of two wagons in Bakersfield, to market his own crops, also to buy and market the crops from other ranches. He has a regular route for his wagons and delivers to customers apples, walnuts, dried fruits, oranges, lemons, almonds and grape fruit. The apples come from his ranch of one hundred and sixty acres, twelve miles above Lemon Cove in Tulare county, while the other products are bought from ranchers and fruit-growers of Kern and Tulare counties. On his ranch he has nine acres in Ben Davis and Winesap apples.

Since coming to Kern county to make his home Mr. Winser has bought a number of lots and has built several houses in Bakersfield and East Bakers- field, these being now rented to tenants. At Tulare, February 17, 1892, he

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was united in marriage with Miss Mary Blanche Beaufoy, who was born in Dover, Kent, England, and by whom he has a son, Lindley, a member of the Kern county high school class of 1915. They are both believers in social- ism and regard its theories as offering a practicable solution to the growing labor evils of the age. The family to which she belongs comprises eight children and three of these came to California, the others, William and Albert Beaufoy, being also residents of Bakersfield. Their parents, the late Samuel and Mary A. (Ayling) Beaufoy, were natives respectively of Nor- folk and Surrey, England, and lived for many years in Dover, where Mr. Beaufoy engaged in mercantile pursuits for a time and later followed the occupation of an accountant. It was not until 1905 that Mr. and Mrs. Winser returned to England to make their first visit among the friends. and relatives known to their earlier years and in that visit, as well as in a later trip made in 1912, they had a pleasant vacation.

HERBERT WILLIAMS WALFORD .- Interesting experiences have individualized the career of Herbert W. Walford, who at different periods of his life has made his home in Europe, Africa and America, and therefore has gained a broad knowledge of the world through travel and habits of close observation. In all of his travels he has found no place more to his liking than California and no country more genial and attractive in climate than this land of sunshine and flowers. White attracted hither in the first in- stance through considerations of health he remained through his own satis- faction with prospects and people, and even after a long period of service in the Boer war he still bore in mind the thought of California, returning hither after a service of five years under the British government in Africa.

Mr. Walford was born in Weston Super Mare, Somerset, England, and is a member of a family of musicians. His parents, Edward and Fannie (Mable) Walford, were natives respectively of Bridgewater, Somerset, and Millverton, England, and now make their home at Fenny Stratford. The family comprises four sons and three daughters. Among the seven, Her- bert W., born September 26, 1870, was fourth in order of birth and is the sole member of the family to establish a home in the United States. The father, a musician of ability and a teacher of considerable prominence, for some years acted as manager of concert tours given in all parts of the British Islands and participated in by all of the children, each of whom he trained for a special part. The specialty of Herbert W. was comic and character song, but he was also proficient with the 'cello and mandolin. As the family traveled extensively he was educated under the charge of a governess. Dur- ing 1895 he suffered the loss of his voice and that experience changed his entire future. Hoping to be benefited by a change he came immediately to California intending to remain but three months. Six weeks after his arrival, owing to an attack of malaria, he sought the fine air of the San Emidio mountains, where he rapidly recuperated. At the expiration of three months in California he wrote to relatives in England that he had decided to remain one year. Before the end of the year he had gotten into the saddle in the employ of the Kern County Land Company and was busily engaged in riding the range, punching cattle and bossing ditch gangs. When the year came to a close he had decided to stay for three years and by that time he liked the country so well that he determined to remain until he had lived in the west for five years altogether and this determination he carried into action.

Returning to England in 1900 with the intention of going on to the Paris Exposition, Mr. Walford fell a victim to the war fever before he had started for Paris and enlisted in the same year as a member of the Baden- Powell Mounted Police or South African Constabulary. Gallant service caused his promotion to the rank of corporal at the expiration of seven months and two months later he was commissioned sergeant and posted at the depot troop, their military base. Having gained the sergeant's stripes for

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services in the field, he obtained permission from the colonel for his marriage to his fiancee, Miss Edith Maynard, an English girl, who was born and reared at Bletchingley, Surrey, being a daughter of William and Alice (Smith) Maynard, the former still a contractor and builder in Bletchingley. Just before he started for Capetown to join his intended, who came out from England to be married, the sergeant was promoted to the rank of troop sergeant major and as he traveled to Capetown he had as an escort a corporal and two troopers, the war being still under full swing. The marriage was solemnized in April of 1902 and at the end of a week the groom returned to his post at Heidelberg, Eastern Transvaal. Three months after the close of the war he was honorably discharged in January of 1903 and then became connected with the Central South African Railroad Company as foreman of construction work. Being able to speak the native Zului and Basuto languages he was well qualified to manage his crew of almost seven hundred natives. Later he was appointed store-keeper in the resident engineer's office at Braamfontein and next was transferred to the signalling department of the chief engineer's office in Johannesburg. Although offered induce- ments to remain in South Africa he resigned his commission April 27, 1905, and returned to England on the Saxon.

After a visit of three months with relatives and friends in England during September of 1905 Mr. Walford returned to California and imme- diately resumed work with the Kern County Land Company. For four months he held a position as foreman of a ditch camp, after which he took up water measurements. Five years later he resigned to become bookkeeper for M. T. Kean, contractor. At the expiration of four months he again re- signed, this time to become assistant dispatcher with the San Joaquin Light and Power Corporation and after ten months in that capacity he was pro- moted to his present position in the main offices of the company. On his return to Bakersfield he built a residence at No. 2009 Twenty-second street, and this attractive home is presided over graciously by Mrs. Walford and is brightened by the presence of four children, namely: Guy, who was born at Johannesburg, Africa; Mollie, whose birth occurred in Surrey, England ; and Jack and Dorothy, both of whom were born in the Bakersfield home. The family are members of the Episcopal Church of Bakersfield and frater- nally Mr. Walford, prominent with the Knights of Pythias, holds rank as first sergeant of the Uniform Rank of that Order.

JOSEPH J. HALTER .- Born in Neckarsulm, Wurtemberg, Germany, August 19, 1858, Mr. Halter attended school there and then entered horti- cultural college at Hohenheim, graduating in 1879. In 1882 he came to the United States and located first in Montgomery county, Ohio, where he remained for five years, being employed in a nursery. In the fall of 1890 he came to California t. start a nursery for E. E. Elliott in Kern county, and he remained here for a year giving valuable service to his employer. He then took charge of the vineyard of Mr. Galtes and after two years moved to Tehachapi, where he engaged in grain farming, and also stockraising. In 1904 he came to his present home tract of twenty acres at Panama, which he now owns and in addition to this he rents two hundred and forty acres, eighty of which adjoins the homestead farm. He devotes most of his time to general farming, dairying and stockraising, and in addition finds time to run an apiary of sixty stands of Italian bees, which has proved a great success.

Mr. Halter is an active member of the Woodmen of the World. He is a well-known man in his community, and has many friends and acquaint- ances. Up-to-date and reliable, he is a citizen that takes deep interest in his country's welfare, and though he has never held office, he is ever ready to do a public-spirited man's duty if called upon. Mr. Halter was married October 5, 1891, in St. Francis Church at Bakersfield, to Odella Rothen-

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fluch, who was born in Alsace Lorraine, Germany, June 3, 1871. They are the parents of nine children, as follows: Lena, Bertha, William, Carrie, Josie, Clair, Anna and Martha.

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History of Kern 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 125

Author: Morgan, Wallace Melvin, 1868- [from old catalog] Publication date: 1914 Publisher: Los Angeles, Cal., Historic record company Number of Pages: 1682

Author: Morgan, Wallace Melvin, 1868- [from old catalog]
Publication date: 1914
Publisher: Los Angeles, Cal., Historic record company
Number of Pages: 1682