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 41

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 41

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O. C. Heck is a native of Iowa and in January of 1898 married Miss Fannie Dustin, of Selma. E. P. Heck, a native of Missouri, was united in marriage in 1904 with Miss Ada Sturgis, of Kansas. During October of 1894 the brothers came from Fort Scott, Kan., to California and settled at Selma, Fresno county, where they engaged in farming and teaming. From that place they came to Oil Center and identified themselves with the oil industry on their own account, developing the Walker-Heck Oil Company. In addi- tion they engaged in the mercantile business. Since coming to Fellows they have continued their mercantile and oil interests and have acquired oil hold- ings here and at McKittrick. Quite recently they have undertaken to de- velon all of section 6. township 29, range 22, and have officiated as directors in the Eagle Creek Company, of which O. C. Heck served as vice-president at one time.

W. L. CUNNINGHAM .- More of shadow than of sunshine surrounded the early years of Mr. Cunningham, who as the eldest son in a large family experienced many privations and made many sacrifices in order that the younger children might have an opportunity to secure educational advan- tages. When a mere lad he became self-supporting. However, it was not enough that he should support himself. With characteristic generosity he used his earnings to aid in the maintenance of the family, hence it has been only of recent years that he has recorded any individual progress, but it is sufficiently rapid to recompense for past delays and sacrifices. Now in the prime of manhood, he may look forward to long years of business and occu- pative activity, years that will enhance his reputation as a competent engi- neer and a successful production foreman in the oil fields.

A native son of the state, Mr. Cunningham was born at Lakeport, Lake county, February 3, 1880, and was the second child and eldest son in a family numbering nine children. When vet very young he accompanied his par- ents to Fresno and there attended the public schools as opportunity offered. At the age of seventeen years, after he had been self-supporting for a con- siderable period, he secured employment in the Copper King mine in Fresno

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county and there he became familiar with the work of an engineer. In this occupation he is said to be an expert. About 1908 he came to the Kern river oil field and secured work as a pumper on the Overland lease, whence in 1910 he came to the West Shore lease. Since then he has continued with the West Shore Oil Company and now is discharging the duties of foreman with characteristic fidelity and intelligence. At San Jose, on Christmas day of . 1902, he was united in marriage with Miss Georgia Johnson of that city and they have a son, Wayland. The family formerly occupied a comfort- able cottage on the company property on section 32, township 28, range 28, in the Kern river field, but now live on the home ranch south of Waits.

HUGH L. McNEW, M.D .- Born October 12, 1869, Dr. McNew is the eld- est child of James H. and Olivia (Kincaid) McNew, parents of ten chil- dren. James H. is now a resident of Texas, his wife having passed away some years ago. Reared in Campbell county, Tenn., the place of his birth, Ilugh L. MeNew became interested in the study of medicine at an early age, and after diligent and patient work was graduated from the University of Tennessee with the class of 1888, receiving the degree of B.S., after which he entered the medical department of Columbia University, at Washington. He was later, in 1892, graduated from the Nashville Medical College, with the degree of M.D., and he immediately started in to practice, choosing as his field of labor Honey Grove, Tex., where he remained for ten years. During this period he found time to take post graduate courses in 1893 in the New York Polytechnic, in 1896 at the Chicago Polytechnic, and in 1898 at the New York Postgraduate school.

In Texas Dr. McNew married Miss Nannie A. Williamson, daughter of J. M. Williamson, a merchant and cotton planter there, and they moved to Dallas, where he practiced medicine, and held the chair of physiology in the Dallas Medical College for two years. The following two years he held the chair of professorship on the practice of medicine. In 1907 he came to Nevada, and then to Los Angeles, Cal., remaining two years, when he came to Bakersfield, to make it his home, and since that time has devoted his time and attention to real estate, in which he has become highly successful. He was instrumental in the organization of the Bakersfield Realty & Building Company, of which he is now vice president, the other officials being Joseph H. Tam. president, N. A. McNew, secretary and treasurer, and the company has offices at No. 3 Hopkins building, where its wide interests are handled. They laid out the following additions: Santa Fe, Sunset tract and Mayflower, which have nearly all been sold in lots. Individually Dr. McNew is also engaged in the real estate business in Los Angeles, having offices at No. 202 Mercantile Place, where he spends part of his time keeping in close touch with land values and where he has been very successful in in- creasing his record of big sales.

Dr. McNew has a fine residence on Nineteenth street, where he and his wife make their home, and they move in the best social circles of the city. He has invested largely in farm lands, and his interests in the county cover a large area.

C. B. COLBY .- A native of Iowa, born in Henry county October 18, 1866, Mr. Colby came west without means, but with an abundance of energy and determination and possessing a fine intelligent and well- trained mind that enabled him to lay the foundation for subsequent success. Since settling at Oakland, Cal., in the year 1899 he has witnessed the steady and interesting development of the state and has himself been a large contributor thereto, his great energy and broad intelligence having been directed toward movements, not alone for his own advancement, but also for the permanent well-being of the commonwealth. While attaining large wealth. at the same time he has been a constant factor in the material

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development of his chosen place of residence and his most recent project, the Western Water Company, already has proved of inestimable value to the oil regions, besides bringing to its promoters returns larger than their most optimistic hopes had anticipated.

Long association with the oil fields convinced Mr. Colby of the neces- sity of cheaper water than they had been able to secure. While acting as manager of the Columbian, M. & S., Lorenzo and Minnehaha Oil Companies, and the H. A. Oil & Water Company (all of which organizations were made successful through his efficient management and energetic supervision), he saw the need of a more adequate water supply for the west side oil fields. With him the first step was to see the necessity, the next step was to create an opportunity. The Western Water Company of Bakersfield was organized in April, 1911, and incorporated under the laws of the state of California. After months of strenuous activity they began to deliver water to customers December 18, 1911, and since then the demand for water has been twice what its promoters anticipated, although no more than they are prepared to supply. Exclusive of the office force, the company now employs twenty men. Having a private telephone system of its own, the officers and workmen can communicate with every plant in the system. Every modern facility has been adopted that will promote the success of the organization. Capitalized at $200,000, the company has two hundred shares at $1,000 each, and as the stock is almost wholly taken in Bakersfield, it is strictly a local enterprise.

Water is drawn from two deep wells, affording an unlimited supply of pure drinking water, used for domestic purposes and for the oil regions at Midway, Taft, Fellows and Maricopa. At the time the company began to pump water the oil fields were paying at the rate of ten to twenty cents per barrel, but this company is now supplying water to the same fields at about three cents a barrel. It is stated that $600,030 was expended on the water system to Taft from the district around Rio Bravo, fourteen miles. Water is distributed to all parts of the district through fourteen miles of twelve-inch line and forty-two miles of eight and six-inch line. Two five hundred-foot wells are pumped at station No. 1, where three two hundred and fifty horse- power gas engines are installed. Large high-pressure pumps force the water to Taft, where the Consumers' Water Company (which recently took over the Taft Public Utilities' Company's holdings of five miles of city lines) delivers the water for domestic use at a price of from four and one-half cents to nine cents per barrel. The Western Water Company is now handling forty thousand barrels a day, the capacity of its lines, and at a reduced price of from three cents to one and three-fourths cents on a sliding scale to the oil companies, a reduction of fifty per cent over what it was six months ago to operators and the cities. The engines of this company are run by steam at Taft and the boilers are fired by natural gas, the large gas engines at their station No. 1 being operated by gas supplied by the California Nat- ural Gas Company. The four pumps (one electric and three steam) are driven by six one hundred-horse power boilers. On the highest point of the neighborhood the company has installed a steel tank with a capacity of fifty- five thousand barrels and this tank is utilized to conserve the surplus water pumped.

From Taft the distributing system' runs twelve and one-half miles north and west and twelve miles south and east. The entire cost of the plant approximated $600,000, but enormous as was the outlay, the company is in a very prosperous financial condition and its shares of stock represent a safe and profitable investment, all of which satisfactory result may be attributed to the wise management of the company's president, C. B. Colby, admittedly one of the most talented business men of Bakersfield, a promoter of ability, a financier whose insight rises almost to genius and a leader who combines

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a conservative spirit with progressive policies. Realizing the vast resources of Kern county, he has not hesitated to promote local movements when once their need is apparent and their possible success made manifest. In every respect he ranks among the most influential, energetic and capable business leaders of Bakersfield. Early in 1912 he completed one of the most costly and elegant residences in Bakersfield and here he and his wife. daughter, Patricia, and son, Charles Bertram, Jr., have established a home whose refinement and hospitality has attracted a host of admiring friends. Mrs. Colby, prior to their marriage in 1907, was Miss Florence Nelson, of Bakersfield.

KATHARYN W. ELLIS, M. D .- When in 1890 she was graduated from the Cincinnati College of Medicine and Surgery it was with the highest honors of the class, her expenses at the institution being partially defrayed by her services as a school teacher. Wider professional knowledge came to her through a post-graduate course at the Women's Medical College of Cin- cinnati and the degree of M. D. also was conferred upon her by that well- known institution in 1893.

A member of the old Wadsworth family of New England, Dr. Ellis traces her ancestry to the illustrious Captain Wadsworth of Hartford, who in Oc- tober, 1687, upon the appearance of Andros in Hartford at the head of a troop of soldiers demanding the surrender of the Connecticut charter, allowed the debate to continue until evening, then ordered all of the candles suddenly ex- tinguished and in the subsequent confusion seized the charter from its box and hid it in a hollow oak on the grounds of Samuel Wyllys, one of the magistrates. Always afterward the tree was known in history as the charter oak. Some years later when Governor Fletcher, of New York, appointed to his office by King William and Queen Mary, attempted to usurp authority in Connecticut and appeared in person at Hartford with his troops for the purpose of reading his instructions, Captain Wadsworth commanded his troops to drum so loudly that the voice of the reader was completely lost in the tumult of noise, so that Fletcher was forced to retreat without having carried out his plan of usurpation.

The parents of Dr. Ellis are Henry and Statira (Goshorn) Wadsworth, natives respectively of Pittsburg, Pa., and Youngstown, Ohio, and now re- siding on their country estate near Falmouth, Pendleton county, Ky. During early manhood Mr. Wadsworth engaged in manufacturing enterprises, but later he turned his attention to farming and settled on a plantation near Gardnersville, Ky., where occurred the birth of his daughter, Katharyn W. the eldest of six children. From early life she displayed exceptional ability and a great desire for knowledge. At the age of sixteen she was graduated from the high school and at eighteen completed the studies of the scientific course at the Central Normal College at Danville, Ind. A portion of each year was then devoted to teaching school in order to add to the funds neces- sary for a professional education. Upon her graduation in medicine she opened an office at Covington, Ky., and while engaged in practice there she became the wife of James F. Ellis, an attorney-at-law. Afterward she built up an important practice at Butler, Ky., and later spent three years at Evan- ston, Wyo., where her clientele included patients for miles in every direction, the conduct of so large a practice entailing many physical hardships, yet bringing rich returns in the satisfaction of realizing a helpful service to hu- manity. During 1901 she came to Kern, now East Bakersfield, and opened an office on Baker street, where since she has conducted a general practice in medicine and surgery. Her only child, Leland Wadsworth Ellis, graduated from the Kern county high school, class of 1913, at the age of sixteen. Since coming to her present location she has identified herself with the Kern County and the California State Medical Associations and has acted as med- ical examiner for the women's auxiliary of the Foresters and the Ladies of

Wr Cuddeback

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the Maccabees. In religion she is a member of the Christian Church. Po- litically she supports Republican principles. In addition to having acquired valuable property in East Bakersfield she has invested elsewhere in Cali- fornia, her chief investment comprising an orange grove of fifty acres at Portersville, a property of great and growing horticultural importance.

WILLIAM N. CUDDEBACK .- The early colonization of America at- tracted from all parts of the world men and women of resolute spirit and energetic temperament. The nation was still in the infancy of its history when the Cudaback family crossed the ocean from Holland .and established themselves among the Dutch residents of Manhattan island. Some of the name (which it may be noted was spelled differently at that period from the present form) became early settlers of Orange county on the Hudson and there founded a village which to this day bears the name of Cudde- backville.

In the family of Peter Cuddeback of Cuddebackville, N. Y., there was a son, Grant Price, who was put to service as a tow boy on the Erie canal on boats owned by the earlier-day Vanderbilts, but finding the work diffi- cult and illy-paid he ran away to seek his fortune in the then unknown west, of whose mysterious solitudes he long had dreamed with the hopeful visions of youth. The path to success proved a toilsome road. Many adventures befell him ere finally he had found his way to the Pacific coast. During the memorable year of 1849 he arrived in Kern county and took up land north of Tehachapi, developing the ranch now known as the old Hale place, besides which he improved a large ranch near the old Lake farm east of Tehachapi. Throughout the Tehachapi valley he was known as a warm friend of the Indians. Their interests were ever safe in his care. With wise counsel he directed many of their undertakings and they came to hold him with affectionate regard. By an Indian ceremony he was made a brother of Chief Phillipe, an adopted relationship that by the terms of the ceremony descended to his sons and daughters and to their descendants forever. Eventually he removed to Orange county and acquired one of the oldest orange groves in that locality, where his interests became very im- portant and extensive. During February of 1905 death removed him from the sphere of his usefulness and terminated the activities that had crowned an honorable existence.

In his marriage Grant Price Cuddeback was united with Almira Hale, a niece of President Franklin Pierce and a descendant of Nathan Hale, the Revolutionary martyr, also connected by family ties with the two presidents, William Henry Harrison and Benjamin Harrison. There were five sons and three daughters in the family of Grant Price Cuddeback. None of these had college educations, for the western schools of their childhood were poorly equipped and inefficiently instructed. William N., who was born in San Bernardino county March 13, 1861, attended the Los Angeles schools for a time, but his present broad fund of information comes from self-culture and habits of close observation. When a babe in arms he was brought into the Tehachapi region. Kern county. For many years he and his younger brother, John P., were associated together as ranchers and cattlemen. When only thirteen years of age he began to be a wage-earner, starting at fifty cents a day, and working up until he earned $1.50 a day and therefore, aside from what his father left to him. he has become wealthy in his own right. nor has his brother been less successful. Their partnership was dissolved in July of 1908, at which time William N. bought the famous old Norboe Salt Lake march of thirty-two hundred acres, five miles east of Tehachapi. For a number of years he kept his herd of cattle on that ranch and also raised grain there in large quantities. besides shipping thousands of tons of salt from the lake. Some years ago the city of Los Angeles bought the greater 18

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part of this ranch as a site for a cement plant, the lake having proved to possess a bed of purest clay, exceptionally valuable for the making of cement. Ile used to graze his cattle in San Bernardino county and Cuddeback lake was named for him.

With the opening and early development of the Imperial valley Mr. Cuddeback, who had watched the vast enterprise with the deepest interest from its inauguration, purchased land which has been devoted to alfalfa, hog-raising and a dairy industry. The ranch proved a very profitable in- vestment and was soll at a high figure. A few years later he bought from Hon. Fred Eaton, former mayor of Los Angeles, an alfalfa and hog ranch in Inyo county. He still manages two hundred and eighty acres of it with gratifying success, raising and feeding stock. During 1910 he became inter- ested in the S. Watkins Live Stock Auctioneering Company and the old Fashion stables in Los Angeles, at the time buying an elegant city residence in the southwest district, where the family spend the winter months, return- ing for the summers to their residence in Tehachapi. Lately Mr. Cuddeback purchased five hundred and eighty acres of land in Palos Verdes valley. Riverside county, which he is developing into a large alfalfa farm. For about twenty-five years he ran a meat market in Tehachapi. but he now rents it. Fraternally Mr. Cuddeback is a member of Tehachapi Lodge No. 313, F. & A. M., in which he has held a number of offices. In politics he and his sons are stanch Republicans. May 10, 1883, he married Miriam Jane Chitwood, a native of Sonoma county and a daughter of Russell and Frances (Ilubbard) Chitwood, of the Tehachapi valley, and a niece of the famous superior court judge, Hon. James E. Prewett. of Auburn, this state. Their family comprises eight children, all living, as follows: Cate M., Mrs. Bone- shell, of Orange, Cal. ; Della, wife of A. J. Blackley, of Alhambra ; Samnel G., who married Elizabeth Erbel, of Invo county ; Margie, who married Arthur Weldon, of Tehachapi; Bertha, Mrs. Victor Phillips, of Monolith ; Ruth, wife of Wilson Easley, of Hayden, Ariz. ; and Charles and Murray, who make their home with their parents.

A. D. FORBES .- The allied companies known as the American Oil- fields, Limited, and the Midland Oilfields, Limited, operating respectively on section 32, 32-24, and section 32, 12-23, have as their assistant superintendent A. D. Forbes, one of the capable young men to ascend to an important place in the Sunset-Midway fields, having made good in a comparatively brief period of identification with the industry. Rapid promotion has resulted from the exercise of industry, intelligence, energy and perseverance. Prac- tical experience in almost every department of work gives him a thorough knowledge of the oil business and qualifies him for still further advancement. While his work has been mainly confined to California districts, he has been outside of the state and has worked in connection with the drilling of wells for water and oil in Oregon not far from the city of Portland. To a large extent his life has been passed in California, but he was born in Nova Scotia at Truro, March 26, 1885. The earliest memories of life cluster around the Pacific coast country, for in 1887 his father, J. F. Forbes, brought the family to California, settling in Ventura county. Removal was made to Coalinga during 1891 and in 1906 he established himself at Orcutt, where he is now postmaster and an influential citizen.

The eldest of four children, all of whom remain in California, A. D. Forbes was educated in the public schools of Coalinga and in 1900 at the age of fifteen years he went to Bakersfield, from there proceeding to the Kern river oil field. For a year he worked as a pumper on the Kern River Oil Company's lease. From 1901 to 1903 he was employed at Fullerton. Return- ing to Coalinga, he found work in the oil fields there. June 27, 1907, he left Coalinga for Portland to take up the work of drilling water and oil wells.

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The drilling for oil was in the nature of a wild-cat proposition. During 1910 he returned to California and later worked in various districts until June of 1912, when he first became associated with the American and Midland Oil- fields, Limited, which companies promoted him to be assistant superintendent July 20, 1913, by this promotion recognizing his efficiency and his ability to aid in the management of the two important leases controlled by the concerns. While giving his attention very closely to the arduous duties on the leases, he has found leisure to identify himself with the other oil operators in the field, has become popular among his co-workers and also has been active in Maricopa Lodge No. 831, Loyal Order of Moose.

GEORGE H. TODD .- 111 1909 Mr. Todd came to California, and began to be interested in oil production and oil-well supplies. A member of an old Missouri family, he was born in St. Joe, February 14, 1876, and is a son of John H. and Martha (Frazier) Todd, natives of Missouri. The latter is deceased, but the former, hale and vigorous at the age of eighty- two, still makes St. Joe his home. The family numbered four children who attained maturity, namely : B. O., an electrician in Oklahoma; William M., a farmer at Savannah, near St. Joe, Mo .; George H., of California; and Nora, who married George W. Carter, an electrician, and at her deathi left one child, I. D. Carter. During the winters George H. Todd attended school in St. Joe, while in summer he helped his father, who was proprietor of a mercantile establishment. After he had graduated from the St. Joe high school with the class of 1892 lie took a course of normal study in a branch of the Kirksville (Mo.) Normal. From 1893 until 1904 he engaged in teach- ing school in Missouri and established a splendid record for efficiency in instruction and discipline. Both in Andrew and Buchanan counties he is still remembered with affection by former pupils and old-time friends.

Engaging in the United States Indian school service in 1904, Mr. Todd continued in the employ of the government until 1909. For two years of this period he taught in the Grand Portage (Minn.) Indian reservation and for one year he acted as disciplinarian at the Crow agency in Crow, Mont., after which for one year he was principal of the Northern Cheyenne train- ing school at Rosebud, Mont. The last year of Indian educational work was spent in Kansas as a teacher in the Kickapoo training school at Hor- ton. Coming to Los Angeles in 1909, he soon became cost clerk for the Los Angeles Manufacturing Company. In their interests he came to Kern county, where he took charge of the Maricopa branch, later was trans- ferred to Taft, where he is now a member of the Petroleum Club and one of the best-known inen in the oil circles of the west side. While still living in Missouri he was married, at St. Joe in 1901, to Miss Maude F. Roberts, daughter of J. P. Roberts, president of the Rea Banking Company of Rea, Andrew county, that state. Since coming to Taft Mr. Todd and his wife have established a comfortable home in the company's residence and he has identified himself with the town as a public-spirited citizen and pro- gressive business man. In his busy life there has not been much leisure for political or fraternal activities, but he is well posted in national problems. supports Democratic principles, and while still making his home in Mis- souri took an active part in the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, be- longing to the lodge at Whitesville, Andrew county.

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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 41

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