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 6

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 6

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

In 1873 mention is made of the fact that Temple, Boushey & Weston were about to begin work on their mine near San Emidio, and expected to ship about 500 tons of ore per month over the railroad to San Francisco for treatment-provided it paid to do so, as apparently it did not.

During the eight days ending June 7, 1873, 1000 bars, or 45 tons of base bullion passed through Bakersfield from the Cerro Gordo mines in Inyo county to the railroad terminus, and the traffic to and from the mines appeared to be increasing. The next month the Kern & Inyo Forwarding Company was advertising for fifty mule teams to haul between Owens lake and Tipton, and was guaranteeing full loads both ways.

A letter from the Panamint mountains in November, 1873, tells of a little ball of silver being taken from the Dolly Varden lode by Edward Hall. The ledge was three feet in thickness and looked good to the prospectors. R. C. Jacobs is mentioned as one of the discoverers of the Panamint mines. About a year later the Panamint excitement was at its height.

In December, 1874, E. R. Burke, who was managing the Big Blue for himself and Senator Jones, is quoted as saying that the average run of the ore paid $15 and cost $5 to handle. The season was an active one in the Long Tom mines.

In 1875 a newspaper note said that the Kernville ledges had been ex- plored for twenty-five miles.

HISTORY OF KERN COUNTY

CHAPTER IV

The Beginning of Agriculture and Stock-Raising

When the first farmers arrived in Kern county is more a matter of tradition than of history. In the early '40s an old immigrant. trail came through Tejon canon from the south, skirted the hills below Bear mountain, wound over the mesa northward, crossing the present line of the Southern Pacific between Bakersfield and Edison and forded Kern river, or Rio Bravo, as it was then known, a short distance above the present bridge between the China grade and the Kern river oil fields. There is reason to believe that sons of men who pioneered the virgin forests and prairies of Tennessee, Kentucky, Arkansas and Texas, driven westward and westward by the hereditary wanderlust, paused on their way to the older sections of the state to feed their stock and let their children stretch their legs among the trees and grassy hills around Tejon and along the fertile banks of Kern river where . Bakersfield now stands. Back in the Tejon hills in the earliest days were gaunt mountaineers of the Tennessee stock, and the first known set- tlers on Kern Island tell of predecessors or signs of predecessors.

These first comers, however, or those, at least, who paused in the valley, were sojourners only. At most they may have hunted and fished for a season and replenished their stores of corn with a crop grown on the quickly responding soil of the Kern delta where it was necessary only to drop the seed and cover it with a little earth scraped up with the foot. Then they passed on, and the next flood or the next sand storm wiped out all trace of their habitation.

John Woodhouse Audubon, in his Western Journal, says that when he passed through what is now Kern county he saw one party of settlers preparing to make permanent homes. Audubon came up from Los Angeles through Tejon cañon in the latter part of November, 1849, with ten men and forty-six mules. Coming through the pass they had to wade knee deep in a torrent of water that poured down the trail. The mountain tops about were covered with snow, and when they emerged on the plain they were greeted with a blast of hail in their faces, swept on by a wind that uprooted cotton- wood trees at the canon's mouth. The plain was wet and boggy, and the party skirted the hills and made long detours to keep on fairly solid ground. Audubon also saw an Indian village and many scattered huts where the natives were grinding acorns and fanning grass seeds for their winter larder. The Indians, he says, were friendly, but he does not undertake to fix the location either of the Indian village or of the settlement of whites. A Lewis woodpecker, Stellar's jay and a new hawk with a white tail were objects that fixed Audubon's attention to quite as great a degree as did the beginning of civilization upon the Kern delta-if that is where the settlers he mentions were pitching their tents.

The first settlers who came and stayed were those of the South Fork, Walker's basin, and other mountain districts contiguous to the early mines. Mr. Seibert is said to have first located in South Fork Valley in 1846. Frank Barrows about 1857 established a claim on the South Fork on the site of the present home of P. T. Brady. John Nicoll came about the same time. William Scodie and Thomas H. Smith settled in the upper end of South Fork valley

HISTORY OF KERN COUNTY

in 1861-62, and the latter resides there to this day. In 1857 William Weldon settled in Walker's basin, moving thence to the South Fork. Weldon and J. V. Roberts in connection with their stock ranch, ran a butcher business and supplied most of the beef consumed by the Keysville miners. In 1858 A. T. Lightner, Sr., sold his mining and milling interests at Keysville and bought a settler's claim in Walker's basin for $1600. With the claim went certain farming implements and a band of 100 to 150 head of Spanish cattle, little and lean and wild.

Other settlers of the South Fork valley were William W. Landers; George Clancy, who came in 1861 ; and J. L. Mack, who arrived about 1864. John McCray, who had lived with his parents for a few years on Kern Island about 1859-60 and later around Visalia, went to the South Fork as a boy in August, 1870, and worked for W. W. Landers until he had acquired cattle and land of his own. Landers was one of the largest stock men of the mountain section, running about 2000 head in the early days and as high as 10,000 head in the '90s.

The raising of hay, vegetables and beef constituted the chief occupation of the early mountain farmers, and all their produce found a ready market in the mining camps. Lightner sold hay at Keysville for $40 to $50 per ton, and a little later hay delivered to the soldiers at Fort Tejon brought, some- · times, as high as $60 per ton. It was while hauling hay to Havilah in 1867 that Lightner lost his life. The morning was cold and frosty, and while going down a hill his foot slipped from the brake and he was thrown forward under the wagon wheels.

Farming in the mountains in these early days was not without other than purely pastoral interest. In the very earliest times there was more or less danger from Indians and bear as well as white marauders and renegades, and on the breaking out of the Civil war the division of sentiment in the state between Union and Confederate was made the excuse for the organization of guerrilla bands, the real object of which was only theft and pillage. Neither the organized bands nor the individual marauders appear to have inflicted any serious harm on the settlers, but they helped to keep their nerves at tension by not infrequent visits. The three Kelso brothers, for example, often demanded the hospitality of the Lightner home, and always, of course, were entertained. They slept on the floor with their clothes all on, their feet toward the hearthstone and their heads on a pile of murderous guns. A. T. Lightner, Jr., had a toy revolver made of the barrel of an abandoned gun with a handle whittled out of wood and thrust into the breech. One of the Kelso brothers, seeing this one night, secured it and while his youngest brother slept, stealthily placed it under his head and drew away one of the small cannon that comprised the desperado's armament. The youthful owner of the toy was a fearful witness of the prank, and his opinion of the desperate character of the youngest Kelso was not changed when the latter awoke and cursed and glowered for hours over the trick that had been played upon him.

The Mason and Henry gang was one of the bands of murderers and horse thieves organized under the cloak of patriotism. About the time the war broke out Mason and Henry called a meeting on Cottonwood creek a short distance south of the mouth of Kern river canon, for the stated purpose of organizing a company of men to join the Confederate army. A large number of Confederate sympathizers, among them W. R. Bower, afterward sheriff

HISTORY OF KERN COUNTY

of the county, responded, but the real character of the gang soon becoming known, Bower and many others withdrew. Later Bower saddled his horse, rode it through to Missouri and served four years under the southern flag, returning to Kern county after a wound in his ankle had put him out of the fight.

The outlaw gang, either before or after the meeting mentioned, built a stone corral or fort, as they called it, on the banks of Cottonwood creek, where remains of it are to be seen to this day. Mason and Henry formerly were employes of the stage line at Elkhorn station and started on their career of crime by stealing so many of the stage animals as they thought they needed. They acted a notable part in the drama of outlawry played out in the San Joaquin valley in the early days of its history.

The South Fork Valley

The South Fork valley is about twenty miles in length and from one to three miles in width. Despite its elevation and the stream that flows through it, it was practically a desert when the first settlers arrived. The ground, very fertile when water was applied, was covered in its virgin state with high sage brush and was suitable for nothing but a rough range for cattle. The very earliest of the settlers cleared about ten acres each about their homes and devoted their energies to herding their cattle up and down the river. From 1861 to 1881 the construction of irrigation ditches to carry water over the valley progressed with more or less industry until finally the whole of the level land was watered and the valley became one of the most productive areas of the state.

John A. Benson surveyed the valley in 1875, charging the settlers at the rate of $150 per quarter section, and such an artistic and satisfactory job did he do, it is said, that hardly a settler was obliged to move more than a few rods of the fences built on section lines run out by instinct and the polar star.

The distribution of the water occasioned a little more difficulty. A number of suits were brought between settlers to determine their respective rights, but few were carried to a conclusion, and to this day there has not been a court decision covering the South Fork irrigation rights generally. About 1899, however, owners of the different ditches drew up and signed an agree- ment, setting aside to each quarter section 150 miner's inches of water and establishing the right of precedence according to priority of location.

In 1885 South Fork failed fully to supply the irrigation ditches, and the waters of Whitney creek were diverted from the North Fork to the South Fork through a tunnel six feet high and six feet wide, driven 350 feet through a hill. The tunnel caved in, and Jeff Gillum was given a contract to make the tunnel an open cut for $1000. He failed to get the cut down to grade, and in the suit over the settlement expert witnesses said that the job could not be done under $3500. The farmers paid the bill, and put a dam across the creek to force the water through the unfinished cut.

In 1895 Miller & Lux and the Kern County Land Company with their affiliated canal companies filed a suit asking for an order of the court enjoining the farmers of the South Fork from using the water they had appropriated, claiming a prior right to all the waters of Kern river and its affluents. The suit was never pressed to a trial, however, and a similar suit filed by the same parties some six years later followed a similar course. In 1908 a third suit was filed and is still pending in the early stages. It is stated that

HISTORY OF KERN COUNTY

the plaintiffs have no expectation of depriving the South Fork irrigators of their water, but desire a court decision fixing the amount they are entitled to divert.

Very recently a government agent made a careful inspection of the South Fork irrigation system and gathered data regarding the suits that had been filed, but the purpose was not given out, and no further develop- ments as yet have indicated what action, if any, the government may have in view.

The height of the cattle business in the South Fork valley was in 1890 to 1899. From then on the restrictions of the Federal Forest Reserve have curtailed the free range which the stockmen previously enjoyed, and the herds accordingly have been reduced to what may be kept on the owners' lands and pastured to the extent permitted within the limits of the reserve.

The revival of activity in the Big Blue mine in 1875 gave farming in the South Fork valley its first great stimulus, and beside the cattle, large quantities of hogs, grain, vegetables and other products were delivered to the mines. In 1872 the culture of alfalfa was begun in the valley by an Englishman named Jack Waterworth on the present home ranch of William Landers. Gradually the growing of alfalfa took the place of wheat raising, and now alfalfa is the principal farm product of the South Fork.

Early Settlers on the Kern Delta

John McCray, now a resident of Bakersfield but best known over the county as a large stock raiser and rancher of the South Fork valley, carries the story of farming on the Kern river delta back a little farther than anyone else the writer has been able thus far to find. John McCray, Sr., with a party of west-bound pioneers under the leadership of Capt. Johnny Roberts, drove a band of 1000 Durham cattle across the plains from Missouri in the early '50s, and John McCray, Jr., was born on the journey, somewhere near Donner lake. The family settled first in Tuolumne county, and went from there to Centerville, on Kings river. At the latter place they were troubled so much with malaria that in 1859 they came to the Kern delta, establishing themselves about three miles south of the present boundaries of Bakersfield. In passing it is to be mentioned that from then until 1864, when the McCrays moved to Visalia to give their children the benefit of schools, not one of the family had a chill.

In 1859 the overland or immigrant road entered the valley through Tejon pass, going from the fort east of Adobe and then drifting westward and northward and crossing the old south fork about eight miles south of what was later the Poindexter place. From there it followed about the course of the present Kern Island road to what was then the Walker Shirley place and what is now the Lowell addition to Bakersfield. The road ran through the present townsite and crossed the river about where the old Jewett avenue bridge formerly stood. From the other side of the river the road followed the present road to Poso creek, past Mon's place and Willow Springs, crossed White river at Irish John's place, and thence past Fountain springs to Porter- ville and Tulare.

The old Butterfield stage road followed the same route from Visalia to a point near the Kern river oil fields, where it headed down a cañon to a point just above the present China grade bridge, where a ferry was operated by Major Gordon between 1861 and 1864, and previously, according to some accounts, by a man named Gale. Major Gordon had an adobe house by his

HISTORY OF KERN COUNTY

ferry, and a pile of dirt remains to this day to mark the spot. From the ferry the stage road turned east along the flat between the river and the bluffs and sought an easy place to scale the latter some distance up the stream from the bottom of the present China grade. The old road is still in use to some extent, about a mile and a half above the bridge. Out east of the Southern Pacific round house a few miles was the first stage station south of the river. Twelve miles farther south there was another, and at Rose station there was another. They changed teams every twelve miles on the entire route, 2888 miles from some place back in Texas through New Mexico and Arizona close to the present route of the Southern Pacific railroad, through Yuma to Los Angeles, thence via Fort Tejon, Kern river, Visalia, Pacheco pass and Gilroy to San Francisco. Between stations the horses went at a gallop, dragging the lum- bering Concord stage with its twelve passengers (and more if the traffic demanded) and the United States mails. They got letters through to San Francisco from St. Louis via El Paso in twenty-four days, and the govern- ment paid the company $600,000 a year subsidy. The cancelled stamps amounted to about $27,000. On the breaking out of the war this mail route was discontinued, and transcontinental letters came via the northern route only.

In 1858 the Pacific and Atlantic Telegraph Company started stringing its wires along this stage route, and in 1860 the line was completed to Los Angeles, where the work, planned to continue east, was halted. Later the Western Union consolidated all the telegraph lines of the coast.

Site of Bakersfield in 1859

The present site of Bakersfield was not, as some reports would make it seem, in the least like a swamp in the '50s. The main channel of the river was down what later came to be known as Panama slough, leaving the present river channel a little way west of the point of Panorama heights and crossing the present intersection of Nineteenth and B streets. It was not a deep channel, although occasional deep holes were bored out of the soft, alluvial bed by the swirling current.

The south fork, flowing a little way west of the present course of the Kern Island canal, was the second largest of the channels that divided the waters of Kern river. It was narrower than the Panama channel, and the banks were steep in most places, making it necessary to choose a place down which a horse could be ridden and often to swim the animal down stream to find a place where he could scramble out on the other side. Lesser sloughs and channels of that day were unimportant except as they encouraged the growth of willows on their banks and tules in their beds and helped the process of sub-irrigation which caused sunflowers, cockleburs, tumble weed and other riotous wild vegetation to grow to fabulous heights over all the inter- vening land.

Beginning of the County's Cattle Industry

The McCrays brought their Durham cattle, between 150 and 200 head, to their new home, and are entitled to the distinction of bringing the first blooded stock to Kern county. About the only other cattleman in this end of the valley at that time was Don David Alexander, who had his headquarters at San Emidio about 1861, and whose 20,000 or 25,000 head of wild, Spanish cattle ranged all over the San Emidio hills and around Kern and Buena Vista lake and the lower reaches of Kern river. Alexander bought all of

HISTORY OF KERN COUNTY

McCray's bull calves and gradually built up the quality of his herd. Cattle were marketed then in San Francisco, and the herds of beeves were driven up the valley to the bay with as little concern for the long journey as many a farmer feels now in driving his stock to the nearest railroad station, six or a dozen miles away.

It was later on that the Crockers, J. C. and Ed, established themselves at Temblor and went into the cattle business on a large scale in connection with Henry Miller. J. C. Crocker was an important figure in the stock business for a score of years following his arrival at Temblor. He acted as Miller's agent in the purchase of both cattle and land, and helped to build up the immense property of Miller & Lux in the San Joaquin valley. It is reported that at the end of twenty years of loose, indefinite partnership with Miller, Crocker asked for an accounting. Miller discouraged the idea and wanted to know what was the use, but Crocker insisted that he was getting on in years and would like to know how much money he was worth. Finally Miller sent him to the book-keepers at the San Francisco office, where Crocker was informed, after due search of the ledgers, that he owed the firm a hundred thousand dollars. Despite these discouraging figures, however, Crocker soon became the owner of one of the finest of the Miller ranches in the Kern delta, long known as the Crocker ranch, and later as the Balfour- Guthrie ranch near Panama. In addition to his renown as a cattle man, Jim Crocker was known throughout the length of the valley as a hunter of out- laws. He was one of the leaders in the successful expedition against Joaquin Murietta, and helped also to mete out summary justice to other evil doers of less unenviable fame.

By 1868 there were many cattlemen and many herds both in the valley and in the mountains and hills. In 1870 John Funk had succeeded Alexander at San Emidio, and was the possessor of great herds.

Meantime the cattlemen were well established in the valleys about Tehachapi, in Walker's basin, in the South Fork valley, around Poso Flat and Granite and in Linn's valley, where Staniford & Dunlap made their headquarters and ranged their herds all through the mountains and foot- hills from Porterville to Tehachapi. Meantime, also, the Jewett Brothers had launched the sheep industry of the county from the Rio Bravo ranch on Kern river, midway between the Kern river oil fields and the mouth of the cañon.

Some of the Very Old Timers

Getting back to the Kern delta in 1860-61, the settlers besides the Mc- Crays included the Shirleys, the Wickers, the Daughertys, the Gilberts, and a little farther south and west toward Buena Vista lake, Tom Barnes and Jim and Jeff Harris. Where Walker Shirley lived (where the Lowell addi- tion is now) was a large thicket of willows growing along the banks of the south fork. Similar thickets were scattered about in the low places where the water frequently overflowed, and the general landscape, viewed from the present center of Bakersfield, was dotted with large cottonwood trees, a con- siderable number of which still remain, not so very much larger than they were fifty years ago. John Shirley lived close to where the Chinese burying ground south of D street is now located. R. M. Gilbert lived where the old race track was built later, at the north end of Chester avenue.

Quite a number of Indian families lived about the present townsite, hunting the deer and antelope and other wild game that abounded, and

HISTORY OF KERN COUNTY

fishing for the trout that swam in lower Kern river at that time. Also they farmed a little and worked, on occasion, for the whites. Mrs. Van Orman, who was formerly Mrs. Gilbert, says the Indians used to jab a sharp stick into the earth, drop a few kernels of corn therein and close the opening with their heels. Later on they harvested the crop, doing little meantime save fish and hunt. The white settlers farmed little more thoroughly, for the crops grew anyway, and what was the use? The Indians built their abodes almost wholly of tules. The whites used willow poles for the frames of their buildings and thatched both sides and roof with tules and flags. When they got to feeling more settled, they built walls of tules and mud, reinforced with willow poles stuck in the earth outside and inside at intervals to keep them from falling over. The most pretentious residences were built of adobes. The floors were invariably of the native earth, raised a little for drainage. There was no lumber, and not even the making of good puncheons. The Gilberts had a well some six or eight feet deep with earthen steps leading down an incline to the water. They walked down and dipped it up instead of using a rope and windlass.

Nobody bothered about titles to land then. They squatted where they pleased, and if their first location did not suit them moved next week or next year as their fancy dictated. People who were not in the cattle business exclusively like the McCrays and Alexander, kept a few cows, a few hogs and maybe a few chickens. It was the easiest place in the world in which to make a living, says Mrs. Van Orman. Bill Daugherty was the pioneer hog raiser of the county, and many tales are told of his ability and prowess not only as a handler of tame swine but with the wild ones that flourished in droves about Buena Vista and Kern lakes. Among his other accomplishments it is stated that Daugherty could grunt so alluringly that the infant porkers would leave their mother's side and run squealing to his outstretched hands. Not only Daugherty but many others of the early settlers used to hunt wild hogs around the lakes. Dogs were specially trained to trail the swine and hold them at bay by barking and nipping their heels until the hunters arrived. No number of dogs, it is said, could kill a large wild boar. Sometimes they chewed his ears to rags, but in the end when the dogs were tired out the hog would rip great gashes in them with his tusks. An unverified legend is to the effect that some of the wild hog hunters, having corralled a bunch of the beasts, would sew up their eyes and using tame hogs as pilots, would drive them to the mountain mines. As a general thing, however, the Buena Vista porkers were better handled in the form of hams and bacon.

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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 6

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