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 147

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 147

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Gardette & Munsey, starting the Kern Valley Garage in the building where now is located his own garage. In 1911 Charles H. Kaar joined the com- pany, and buying cut the others, they began to do business as the Studebaker Garage, the firm now being known as Kaar & Graham. It is the largest garage in Bakersfield, occupying a building 132×115 in dimensions, and they have the agency for the Studebaker cars. Mr. Graham is superintendent of the garage and machine shop, and a large general auto supply department has been added, making the concern complete in every particular and capable of hand- ling any make of car.

Mr. Graham was married in Bakersfield to Miss Zora Perkett, who was born in Jackson, Amador county, and they have a daughter, Martha. Made a Mason in Lima Lodge No. 205, F. & A. M., Mr. Graham was raised to the Royal Arch degree in Lima Chapter, No. 49, R. A. M., and later was made a Knight Templar in Bakersfield Commandery No. 39, K. T., of which he is now Eminent Commander. He is also a member of Al Malaikah Temple, N. M. S., of Los Angeles.

FRANK A. MILLIFF .- A well-informed and practical oil refiner is found in Frank A. Milliff, who was born in Cleveland, Ohio, April 24, 1876. His father, John Milliff, was one of the early refiners of oil, having engaged in the business from 1865 until he retired in 1900. His death occurred in Findlay, Ohio, in 1904. Of his family of six sons all are in the oil and refining business.

After graduating from the public schools of Cleveland, Mr. Milliff entered St. Ignatius College where he continued his studies for three years. In 1892 he entered the employ of the Standard Oil Company at Parkersburg, W. Va., and there began to learn the refining of cil, and afterwards in the same capacity at their Cleveland No. 2 Refinery. Next he went with the Canfield Oil Company at Findlay, Ohio, and while there became assistant superintend- ent. After four years with the company he resigned to come to California in 1904 for the Bulls Head Oil Company (now the American Oriental Oil Com- pany) to build their compounding plant at Martinez. This was the first plant to make a success of the compounding of all kinds of grease and oil from the California product. The manufactured articles took the gold medal at the Lewis and Clark exposition in Portland. In 1905 Mr. Milliff entered the employ of the Union Oil Company of California as superintendent of construc- tion and built their refinery at Oleum, and on the completion of the plant was made superintendent of the refinery. In 1906 he resigned and for a year was engaged in business for himself when he accepted the position of assistant superintendent of construction for the Associated Pipe Line Company. When the pipe line was completed to Port Costa he was placed in charge of that station. In June, 1912, he came to Lost Hills as superintendent of construc- tion of the refinery for the Universal Oil Company and since its completion has been superintendent of the refinery.

In Martinez, Calif., occurred Mr. Milliff's marriage with Miss Rose A. Hurley, a native daughter of that place, and to them have been born three children, Francis, William and Raymond. His zeal and ardor for the Stars and Stripes was shown in April, 1898, when he volunteered his services for the Spanish-American war, enlisting in Battery A, First Ohio Light Artillery. He served with his battery until they were mustered out and was honorably discharged at Columbus, Ohio, after nine months' service. He is a charter member of General Fitzhugh Lee Camp, Society of the Spanish-American War Veterans, of which he was the first commander.

E. J. BARKER .- Among the business men who are contributing to the upbuilding of Lost Hills we find E. J. Barker, the proprietor of The Toggery, a business handling exclusive men's furnishings, and he is also a merchant tailor. He was born in Jacksonville, Ind., in March, 1882, and was raised on the farm and educated in the local public schools. When fourteen years of age

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he was apprenticed to the tailor's trade under his uncle. Later on, however, he discontinued the trade to follow the oil business and became a driller in Indiana, afterwards working in the same capacity in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas and Kansas. In 1899 he made his first trip to California, where he spent nine months in the Los Angeles oil field. He then spent some time in Mexico and Central America, returning to California to follow the oil busi- ness in Los Angeles, Taft and Coalinga until October, 1911, when he located in Lost Hills and began the mercantile trade. He established The Toggery and is doing a successful and satisfactory business.

On August 10, 1910, in Los Angeles, Mr. Barker was married to Miss Frances Seigel, a native of New York City, who came to California in 1907. Politically, Mr. Barker is a straight-out Democrat.

MAHLON PAYNE .- Whatever measure of success has come to Mr. Payne in the varied activities of existence, the credit for such achievements must be given to his own determined efforts unaided by any of the extraneous circumstances that oftentimes promote prosperity. Educational advantages he had none. Even the limited opportunities afforded by country schools of past generations were almost beyond his reach, yet he has succeeded, not- withstanding the discouraging environment of his youth. From the age of thirteen, when he lost his father, he was obliged to earn his own livelihood and thereafter drifted from one farm to another as he worked "for board and clothes." Of his mother he has no recollection whatever, for he was scarcely three years of age when he suffered an irreparable bereavement in her death.

The original home of the Payne family was in North Carolina, whence Barnabas Payne and his widowed mother removed to Indiana in 1830 and settled on a farm near North Manchester, Wabash county. After the youth had attained man's estate he married Miss Huldah Bond, a native of Ohio, but from early childhood a resident of Wayne county, Ind. The young couple settled on a farm in Wabash county and devoted themselves to the develop- ment of land. Six children were born of their union, and all were still young when the mother died in 1855. The father passed away in 1866 on the Wabash county farm. Their first-born son, Elias, a farmer by occupation, died in Wabash county at the age of thirty-one years, leaving a wife and two children. The eldest daughter, Luzena, is the widow of William Brindle and lives on a farm in Blackford county, Ind. The second son, Albert, died, unmarried, at the age of twenty-seven. Anna married Levi Walters and lives on a farm in Wabash county ; Jesse is living retired in Los Angeles.

The youngest member of the family circle, Mahlon Payne, was born in Wabash county, Ind., September 25, 1852, and endured all the privations inci- dent to being poor and an orphan. He remembers the excitement incident to the Civil war, which began when he was less than ten years of age. With equal clearness he also recalls the prevalence of malaria and other forms of disease common in a new country. As a lad of thirteen he began to work as a farm hand and thereafter he did a man's work for a boy's wages until he married and went to Kansas. At the age of twenty-four he married Miss Amanda Garretson, a native of McLean county, Ill., and a daughter of Talbot and Mary Ann (Dysart) Garretson, both of whom were born in Ohio. After his marriage Mr. Payne removed to Kansas and bought railroad land in An- derson county, where he and his young wife lived in a cabin that cost them $85. Believing the prospects in that locality to be unfavorable, he removed to Nebraska and bought one hundred and sixty acres of deeded land in Seward county. The improvement of the acreage brought him a fair degree of material prosperity. Stock-raising and grain-farming engaged his attention. In spite of having much sickness in the family, on the whole he prospered and each year found him with a small amount added to his growing capital. After some years on the farm he moved into the city of York, York county,

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Neb., from which point he engaged in shipping live stock to Omaha. From York he and his wife came to California, arriving at Bakersfield July 22, 1907, and shortly afterward settling on a fruit and alfalfa farm of ten acres on Union avenue. During the spring of 1911 he sold the ranch and came to Bakersfield, where he bought seven lots and began building operations. Since then he has expended a large sum in the erection of bungalows.

Besides his own home at No. 331 Eighteenth street, Mr. Payne has built the cottage bungalows at Nos. 325, 401 and 403 Eighteenth street, in the Kruse tract. It was he who erected the first house on this terrace. In 1912 there were only two houses in the tract, but in 1913 there are twenty, all of them modern, substantial and up-to-date. The task of building still engages the attention of Mr. Payne and when all of the lots are improved he will devote his attention to the care of the cottages and property. Honorable in every dealing, forceful in temperament, whole-souled in spirit and upright in act, he forms a valuable accession to that class of citizens so necessary to the permanent prosperity of Bakersfield. Politically he always has been inde- pendent. In religion he and his wife adhere to the doctrines of the Christian Church. Their family has numbered five children, but one of these, Ernest M., died at the age of twenty-seven, leaving a wife and daughter, Mercedes. The surviving sons and daughter are as follows: Clarence C., an optician and watchmaker at Modesto, Cal .; Elmer A., a farmer in Seward county, Neb .; Orville D., a watch-maker, engraver and optician doing business at Woodland, Cal., and Irene D., now connected as bookkeeper with the Pioneer Mercantile Company of Bakersfield. Remembering with regret his own lack of early advantages, it has been the aim of Mr. Payne's life to give his children good educations and in this ambition he has been successful, with the result that the sons and daughter are more than ordinarily well-informed, promising and capable.

CHARLES HARDISTY .- During one of the religious persecutions that threw their somber shadows over Scotland in the middle ages the Hardisty family was forced to seek a haven of refuge in Ireland and later the name was transplanted to the shores of England. Upon the organization of the expedition for the new world under Capt. John Smith and other hardy adventurers, two brothers, James and Tommy Hardisty, joined the party of emigrants from England and sailed with them on the long voyage to Vir- ginia, landing April 26, 1607. With others of the new-comers they founded Jamestown on the 13th of May. Thenceforward successive generations lived and labored in the Old Dominion and meantime the family was represented in the Indian wars, in the great Revolutionary struggle and other early con- tests for supremacy in the new world. One branch of the family established itself in Pennsylvania and Samuel Hardisty was born in Fayette county, that state. During the Civil war he and his four brothers fought in the Union army from the opening of the great struggle until peace was declared four years later. Prominent characteristics of the family are longevity, powerful physique, robustness of constitution and acumen of intellect.

When oil was first discovered in West Virginia one of the pioneers in the Volcano oil fields twenty miles from Parkersburg was Samuel Hardistv, already known as an expert driller and competent production man. After settling in West Virginia he married Miss Julia Leach, who was born and reared in Ritchie county, that state, and who traced her lineage to Scotch an- cestors identified with the colonial history of Maryland and represented in the Revolutionary war. Three daughters and a son, Charles, were born of the union. The eldest child, Ella, is the wife of Henry Lowther, connected with the production department of the Standard Oil Company at Tulsa, Okla. The third child, Carolina, is the wife of Edward Ross, and the youngest, Bertha,

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married Roy Trobb. Both these gentlemen are employed in the producing department of the South Penn Oil Company, near Parkersburg, W. Va.

During the residence of the family in the Volcano oil field in West Vir- ginia the birth of Charles Hardisty took place March 7, 1864. From an early age he was obliged to be self-supporting. When only thirteen he began pumping for John A. Steele, the well-known oil man of Parkersburg. From the first he showed not only willingness, but also intelligence. Soon he was trained in the art of dressing tools, which line of work he followed for some time. At the age of twenty-two he became a driller, learning the trade by practical work in production. Prior to taking up the work of driller he had been employed under his father, then superintendent of a West Virginia oil company, and later he started out to make his own way in the world. For a time he worked in the Beaumont field in Texas and at Jennings, La., besides which he worked for an English syndicate on the Dos Bocos lease, containing the world's greatest gusher, with a record surpassing even the famous Lake- view gusher. It made a record of one hundred thousand barrels per day. Unfortunately, the oil caught on fire, flames arose seventeen hundred feet in height and the whole well was destroyed. When finally the fire died down, the well gushed hot water at a temperature of one hundred and seventy-five degrees. The water increased in its flow and volume until it made twenty-five million barrels per day, with a crater covering thirty-five acres. The well still flows, but in a reduced amount.

Any recital of the business connections of Mr. Hardisty must include his eight years of work in the production department of the South Penn Oil Company in West Virginia, where he made an excellent record for efficiency and trustworthiness. It must also include five years of successful work as a driller for water wells for the Texas Pacific Railroad between Fort Worth and El Paso. After six months in Mexico he came to California and joined in Kern county J. A. Pollard, who had been a superintendent for the Pierson Company in Mexico, but in 1910 was acting as superintendent of the Honolulu Consolidated Oil Company on section 10, township 32, range 24, and is now employed as a government geologist in Oklahoma. Mr. Hardisty had worked under Mr. Pollard in Mexico and re-entered his service in California, where he since has acted as production foreman for the Honolulu, one of the most promising concerns in the oil fields of Kern county and already credited with several of the best gushers in the Midway field. Besides having charge of oil production in this township he manages the water system and superintends the pumping of the water from Buena Vista lake, also has charge of the gas production, the latter being sold to the Midway Gas Company and by them piped to Los Angeles. While employed in Texas in 1889 Mr. Hardisty married Miss Annie Robbins, who died in West Virginia in 1907. Mr. Hardisty is of the Baptist faith, and politically he is a Republican of the progressive type. While in Louisiana he was connected with the Elks at jennings During his residence in West Virginia he was made a Mason at Pennsboro, Ritchie county, and later he was raised to the Scottish Rite in Oklahoma, joining the consistory at Guthrie, that state.

CAPT. PAUL MORTENSON .- Off the coast of Denmark where the narrow and tumultuous channel of the Skager Rack meets the broader current of the Cattegat lies the small island of Lesso, where Captain Mortenson was born January 18, 1849, the son of a merchant doing business among the fisher- men and farmers who inhabited the island. Reared within sight of the sea, accustomed to the coming and going of ocean vessels, and to the tales of old mariners concerning storms and wrecks far and near, it was natural that he should have been drawn toward the occupation of a sailor. With the courage inherited from a long line if ancestors inured to seafaring experiences, he left home at the age of fourteen years and shipped to sea on a Danish vessel trad-

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ing in European ports. As he learned the rudiments essential to good sea- manship he also had the privilege of seeing much of Europe. After a few years he sailed from Hamburg on the barque John Brown for Nova Scotia, but encountered such serious storms that it was necessary for the ship to put back to Queenstown in distress. Shortly afterward he sailed on an English barque called the Red Cross Knight, which rounded Cape Horn, thence sailed along the Pacific coast and in July of 1869 entered the harbor of the Golden Gate.

The completion of the first trans-continental railroad was bringing to San Francisco an era of great prosperity and the young sailor decided to re- main. Being skilled in the arts of the seafaring occupation, he experienced no difficulty in securing work. For a time he was mate in the coasting trade with a vessel known as the Mary Tyler, of which later he was promoted to be captain. Afterward he served as captain on different schooners. Eventually he assumed command of a large, full-rigged vessel, called the Snow and Bur- gess, of which he continued to be master for nine years, meantime sailing to Australia, Siberia and other foreign ports. At the time of the Boer war he was master of an iron ship, known as the Star of Russia, which made a number of voyages to Africa. From that country he sailed to Australia, loaded the vessel with coal for Honclulu and then returned to the Pacific coast of Amer- ica, anchoring in Puget Sound in 1901. It lacked but little of being forty years since he had first shipped from the Danish island, a mere boy, knowing little of the dangers he was to face during the long period of his life as sailor and master of ships. Although he had encountered many severe storms he had never lost a ship, but calm and collected in the midst of danger, he had always brought his men and the vessel through in safety to the destined ports. Now, however, he had begun to crave a more settled existence than a captain could enjoy, so he resigned from the command of the ship, came to Bakers- field and in 1902 erected the Mortenson hotel on the corner of I and Twenty- second streets, a commodious and substantial three-story building, in which ever since he has conducted an hotel enjoying a large patronage and growing popularity. For four and one-half years, beginning in 1906, he also served as a member of the police force of Bakersfield. As early as 1872 he became a member of the Improved Order of Red Men in San Francisco and during one of his sojourns in Australia he was made a Mason in the Melbourne lodge, where he still holds membership. In San Francisco he married Miss Bridget T. Fleming, a native of Ireland, who came to San Francisco in 1873 and by whom he became the father of six children, namely: Mrs. Mary Lind, of Bakersfield ; Margaret, Paul and Thomas, also of this city; Nellie, deceased ; and Henrietta, at home.

OTTO KRAMER .- The Midway Hardware Company, of which Mr. Kramer is the resident manager, is one of the recent important accessions to the commercial development of Fellows and conducts a large business in a fire-proof building erected for that purpose in the early part of 1912. By means of a partnership formed with E. H. Holt, a non-resident, Mr. Kramer was enabled to erect a building especially adapted to the hardware business and has since established a growing patronage among the people of the lo- cality.

A native of Kansas, born in Jefferson county August 12, 1882, and reared in the same section of country, Mr. Kramer spent all of his early years in the Sunflower state. From the age of twenty-three he has been connected with the hardware business, which he learned while clerking in the hardware and agricultural implement department of the general mercantile store owned by Root Brothers in Ozawkie, Jefferson county. Later he was connected with the same department in the Griffith general mercantile store at Ozawkie, where he remained a trusted employe until he was induced to come to California in 1910.

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June of that year found him a clerk in the hardware department of Heck Bros., dealers in general merchandise at Fellows, with whom he continued for two years and then resigned in order to engage in business with Mr. Holt under the firm title of the Midway Hardware Company. The large and increas- ing trade of the company results from the honorable methods employed in all transactions and the fact that the best goods only are kept and all stock is sold at a price as low as consistent with a reasonable profit. The long experience of the proprietor in the hardware line qualifies him for a successful connection with the business.

JOSE MIER .- An ancient Castilian family is represented by Jose Mier, an enterprising young Spaniard who since 1892 has been identified with the sheep industry of California, but recently disposing of a large flock that had been built up and made valuable through his own tireless care and intelligent oversight. The Spanish province of the Asturias is his native place and he was born March 19, 1876, in the village of Colosia near Santander, a famous ocean port. At the age of sixteen he started across the ocean for America, his objective point being California, whither relatives had preceded him. Upon his arrival in Kern county he was able to secure employment under an uncle, who was one of the trusted foremen connected with the great corporation of Miller & Lux.

Finally Mr. Mier felt justified in starting a flock of his own and with a large tract in Nevada as headquarters he kept his range in that state for five years, during this time having his share of ups and downs. His experience, however, was sufficiently profitable to cause him to re-enter the business after he had sold his original flock and returned to Bakersfield. With his second flock he maintained ranges in the plains and on the mountains, but eventually in 1912 he sold the entire bunch. Since then he has acted as assistant to his uncle, Faustino Noriega, proprietor of the Noriega hotel at No. 525 Sumner street, East Bakersfield, and with this uncle he has also purchased an alfalfa and grain ranch of one hundred and sixty acres situated in Kern county. In politics he votes with the Republican party. On the corner of Pacific and Kings streets he owns a comfortable residence, brightened by the presence of his four children, Clemence, Faustino, Martin and Alberto, and managed with housewifely skill by his wife, whom he married in East Bakersfield in 1907 and who was Miss Celena Etchevery, born at Aldudes, Basses-Pyrenees, France, not far distant from the scenes familiar to his own boyhood. The family hold membership with St. Joseph's Catholic Church.

JOSEPH G. JONES .- The first representative of the Jones family in America was Thomas Jones, a Welshman of such pronounced loyalty to the land of his adoption that he volunteered his services to aid the Union during the Civil war. Assigned to a Delaware regiment and sent to the front with his command, he stood the test of good soldiery in camp, on the long marches and during the fiercely contested battles. It was while bravely fighting on the field of battle that he received the wound that caused his death. Sharing with him in his patriotic devotion to country were his three sons, all of whom volunteered in the service and remained at the front until honorably dis- charged at the expiration of their terms of service. One of the three, George, was born at Wilmington, Del., and after the close of the war became manager for the Dixon Shoe Company at Baltimore, filling the position until his death in 1873 at the age of thirty-four years. The hardships and sufferings of war times had hastened his untimely demise. During young manhood he had married Mary E. Kelty, who was born in Baltimore and still makes that city her home. Of their five children three are living, Joseph G. being the youngest and the only one to locate in California. Born in Baltimore, September 27, 1871, he received his education in the schools of that place.

When seventeen Mr. Jones began an apprenticeship to the trade of

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plumber under James McCrea, with whom he continued for three years. The next two years were spent in the largest plumbing establishment in Balti- more, a shop owned and conducted by W. H. Rothrock. During the five years of service he had acquired a thorough knowledge of every detail con- nected with the plumbing business and was well qualified for independent work. Leaving Baltimore he traveled through New York, Maryland, Dela- ware, Connecticut, Pennsylvania and Virginia and in each of these states did important work as a journeyman. Jobs of large dimensions were entrusted to his care and faithfully performed. During 1902 he came to California and worked at his trade successively in Sacramento, Stockton, San Francisco and Oakland. With a thorough understanding of the trade in its every detail, he had become fitted for contract work many years before, but did not enter into the taking of contracts until after he went to Mill valley and San Rafael, where he filled contracts for the plumbing work in some very costly resi- dences. Arriving in Bakersfield during January of 1909 he followed the trade as a journeyman for six months and then embarked in business as a con- tractor, since which he has been retained on many jobs of importance. At his shop, No. 1514 Eighteenth street, he carries in stock a full equipment of plumbing and heating supplies, and it is his intention to enlarge his equip- ment from year to year, to keep pace with the constant growth of the town. At this writing he holds office as vice-president of the Bakersfield Master Plumbers' Association, in the work of which he is deeply and actively inter- ested. In national principles he supports Republican men and measures.

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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 147

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