USA > California > Los Angeles County > History of Los Angeles county, Volume II > Part 19
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Henry Howard Dorland is a member of the Society of Friends at Whittier, and he and his children make their home with his sister, Mrs. Annie Lee Coffman, at 130 North Painter Avenue, Whittier.
CHARLES H. HAMBURG is one of the surviving representatives of the pioneer Friends in the colony of Whittier. His experiences here
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reflect some of the most important points in the history of the colony. He came here dependent upon the labor of his hands, and he performed a great deal of hard labor, always exercising good judgment and fore- sight, and the result is that today he is one of the largest owners of citrus groves and other property in the Whittier district.
He was born in Germany, July 4, 1863, but was brought to America when a small boy, his parents locating in Wisconsin. His father died soon afterward. He grew up with his widowed mother, who also came to California, and died at Yorba Linda on March 11, 1920. As a boy in Wisconsin he attended public schools, depending upon such schools for his education until he was seventeen, and he then attended a Friends Academy in Wisconsin. During these years he was supporting him- self. Mr. Hamburg came to Whittier, California in 1887, with a party of eighteen Friends, of which but seven remain alive. His first work here was assisting in the construction of a store for Charles Vernon. This was the first grocery store in the little colony. He worked in the store for Mr. Vernon until January 1, 1888. Then, in partnership with Fred Coryell, he established a nursery, and he has been more or less actively indentified with the nursery business ever since. After a year the partnership was dissolved, and during 1889-90 Mr. Hamburg was employed in Los Angeles by the Empire Steam Laundry.
Affairs at Whittier were still at a low ebb when he returned in 1890. His next service was as florist and landscape gardener in laying out and planting the grounds for the State School. The following winter he continued his own education as a student in the Friends Academy. His teacher for one term was Bevin Johnson.
During the following four years Mr. Hamburg managed the Lindley Hotel. In this period he acquired his first real estate, purchasing lot 4 in block F. This land was later sold to the city as additional grounds for the high school property. On the lot a house twenty-two feet square was built. To that he took his bride, and in this home their first three children were born. While in the hotel business Mr. Hamburg met Miss Bertha Ann Morris. They were united in marriage Decem- ber 21, 1892.
On this property he resumed the nursery business, and later bought ground on West Philadelphia Street, where the Union Depot now stands, and about 1905 built a house there. The house stood on ground now covered by the offices of the Barr Lumber Company. In the meantime Mr. Hamburg had purchased ten acres on North Citrus Avenue. This he had planted to oranges. Still later he purchased twenty acres in Cohen's tract, in the Mills School district. All this time he was deriving an income from the nursery business. Some of his Whittier property in November, 1916, he traded, with the payment of additional cash, for the eight acres where he makes his present home on Lemon Street, near Palm. On this he built an attractive home in the Swiss chalet style, richly finished in Oak, a structure that at the present time would cost at least $20,000. The grounds around his home are planted in valencia oranges, and he has added many avocado trees. His nursery business is now confined to the propagation of avocadoes. His home is located on one of the most ideal building spots in the district. It commands a magnificent view of the valley, with the Santa Fe Springs in the distance and Los Angeles lying in plain view between his home and the sea. In clear weather the Catalina Islands are visible. The view offers a picture that is equaled in but few places in the state. His land is within the oil district, being part of the same anticlinal fold, with producing wells close at hand. This district is known as Citrus Grove Heights and is above the frost belt.
These valuable properties do not comprise all of Mr. Hamburg's realty holdings. He has ten acres of lemon and grape fruit groves at Yorba Linda, this being part of twenty-five acres, the other fifteen being owned by members of the family. He also owns a ten acre
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orange grove on Citrus Avenue in Whittier ; fifteen acres of walnuts in the Cohen tract of the Mills district and four acres of oranges in the same district. Mr. Hamburg personally planted all this land to citrus fruits and walnuts. He is a member of the Whittier Select, Whittier Orange and Lemon Growers, Whittier Walnuts, and Citrus associa- tions, the latter being at Yorba Linda. He bought a lot in Whittier when he first came, and later sold it, losing more money in the transaction than the amount he brought to California.
Mr. Hamburg was one of the organizers and is a director and vice president of the First National Bank of Yorba Linda, and is interested in the Whittier Savings Bank and the First National Bank of Whittier. He is a prohibitionist in politics, though his interest does not extend beyond his home community. He and Mrs. Hamburg have always been faithful to the Church of the Friends, and are very active in the congregation at Monticello, Mr. Hamburg being one of the overseers and a Sunday School teacher.
The four children of Mr. and Mrs. Hamburg are: Miss Irma R., teacher in the California College of Los Angeles; Ralph M., who owns and farms 571/2 acres in the San Fernando Valley and also assists his father in the care of the groves; Harriet T., wife of Harold E. Nelson, of Santa Ana; and Miss Esther N., member of the class of 1922 in the California College in Hollywood.
ALBERT MCFARLAND came to California in 1884 and purchased an interest in the Los Angeles Times, and with this representative paper he continued his connection, as treasurer of the publishing company, until his death, February 18, 1911, at the venerable age of eighty-seven years. He was one of the veteran and honored newspaper men of California, a citizen who in a quiet personal way and through the medium of his news- paper had wielded much influence and who had been prominent for his civic loyalty and public spirit. He was a writer of exceptional power and versatility, and his editorials in the Los Angeles Times marked leadership in local sentiment and action. Not until one year prior to his death did this venerable journalist give up his active service in connection with the Los Angeles Times.
Mr. McFarland was born near Columbus, Ohio, on the 1st of August, 1823, and as a lad of five years he had the privilege of seeing the first rail- road train leave the station in the capital city of the Buckeye State. He was reared under the conditions and influences of the pioneer period in the history of Ohio, and in his case was demonstrated most effectively the consistency of the statement that the discipline of a printing office is equivalent to a liberal education. As a boy he entered upon an apprentice- ship in the office of the Ohio State Journal, and after remaining with this paper several years he became editor and publisher of the Portsmouth Tribune at Portsmouth, Ohio. He brought this paper to high standard and continued as its editor a number of years. In 1884, as previously noted, he came to California and became associated with the Los Angeles Times, to the advancing of which he gave the best of his service, fortified by long experience and high professional and civic ideals. His political allegiance was given to the republican party and he was an effective advo- cate of its principles and policies. Both he and his wife were communi- cants of St. Paul's Church, Protestant Episcopal, in Los Angeles at the time of their deaths, their attractive home having been at 1340 Crown Hill Avenue.
In Ohio was solemnized the marriage of Mr. McFarland and Miss Eliza J. Doddridge, who was born in that state December 7, 1828, her parents having been pioneers of Ohio and her father having been a rep- resentative of an old and distinguished Virginia family. Mrs. McFarland was a daughter of Joseph Doddridge, who was a leading merchant at Circleville, Ohio, for many years prior to his death. The ideal marital companionship of Mr. and Mrs. McFarland covered a period of sixty-four
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Albert Mcfarland
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years, and the gracious ties were severed only when he was called to eternal rest. Mrs. McFarland survived her husband by eleven years and was ninety-three years of age at the time of her death, February 20, 1922, she having retained full command of her faculties until the close of her long and noble life, in which she had endeared herself to all who came within the sphere of her gentle and gracious influence. Of their four children, two are living: Daniel and Mrs. E. D. Bonsall, both residents of Los Angeles, the latter being the widow of Major William H. Bonsall. Mrs. McFarland was survived also by ten grandchildren and thirteen great- grandchildren. The marriage of Major and Mrs. William H. Bonsall was solemnized October 2, 1871, at Portsmouth, Ohio, their children having been five in number: Mrs. E. C. Hamilton, of Long Beach, California ; Samuel, of Los Angeles ; Albert, who died in March, 1922; and Mrs. T. P. Newton and Mrs. Samuel Haskins, both residents of Los Angeles.
WILLIAM VOLKMOR. A resident of Los Angeles County since 1890, William Volkmor has spent all this time in the Whittier community. He has been an extremely useful citizen, both in his business affairs and in the quality of public spirit he has shown for every movement connected with the general welfare.
Mr. Volkmor was born at Massillon, Stark County, Ohio, August 30, ' 1864, son of Levi and Mary (Hertle) Volkmor. His mother was born in Ohio and died in 1889. His father, a native of Germany, was brought to America when a young boy, and for many years was employed in the big Russell Manufacturing Works at Massillon. Subsequently he turned his attention to farming, becoming the owner of a large tract of land in Ohio. He died in December, 1914.
William Volkmor acquired a public school education, had considerable experience of practical work on his father's farm, but as soon as practicable learned the mechanical trade of blacksmith and horse shoer, and that trade has been the real foundation of his business success in life. After leaving the farm he followed his trade in the East until he moved to California.
Mr. Volkmor was employed as an instructor in the State School at Whittier for twelve years. He then resumed work at his trade, and devel- oped and conducted a very prosperous establishment there for eleven years. In 1913 he bought a young eight-acre lemon grove on the slope of the hills at 715 Lemon Street. This grove is ideally situated above the frost belt, and the trees are now in full bearing. Among them at this location he has built a comfortable and commodious home, commanding a delightful view of the valley by day and the star like lights of the distant city of Los Angeles by night.
Besides this property Mr. Volkmor owns other real estate in Whittier, including the ground and the garage building now occupied by the Ford agency at the corner of South Greenleaf Avenue and College Street. About seventeen years ago he bought a hundred sixty-two acres of land six miles east of Las Vegas, Nevada. The future holds much for this territory that in the past has attracted but little attention. Mr. Volkmor is a republican, and has been quite active in the local party organization. From 1910 to 1914 he was a city trustee of Whittier, and for twenty years was an active member of the Chamber of Commerce, finally withdrawing from that organization on account of failing health. He is a member of the Catholic Church, and was a charter member and is a director and one of the most enthusiastic workers in the local branch of the Knights of Columbus.
September 15, 1889, at Los Angeles, Mr. Volkmor married Miss Sarah K. King, a native of Michigan. They are the parents of three children. Hilda, the oldest, is a graduate of the Whittier High School and Stanford University, and is the wife of Neil Thoim, of San Francisco, now a resident of Hermosa Beach. Mr. and Mrs. Thoim have three children, Martha Jane, John and Barbara Clara. The second child is Miss Barbara Volkmor, a graduate of Whittier High School and Ramona College. The youngest,
-
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Walter Volkmor, is a student of law in Georgetown University at Washington, District of Columbia.
CHOUINARD SCHOOL OF ART. The City of Los Angeles has become widely famed for the exceptionally high standard of its cultural mediums and advantages, and a special contribution to this prestige is that made by the Chouinard School of Art, which is temporarily established at 2606 West Eighth Street and which in its facilities and work represents the most modern functions and ideals. This school was opened in June, 1921, and within two weeks thereafter it showed an enrollment of thirty-five students. In the winter of 1921-2 the institution had an enrollment of 150 students, and at the time of this writing, in the fall of 1922, the school opened with 150 students, an unduly rapid growth.
Mrs. Chouinard, the founder of this excellent school, spent five years in the study of art in New York City, and continued her study of art work in various forms for several years with men of prominence. She came to Pasadena, California, in 1909, and was for one year at the Throop Poly- technic Institute and one year with Ernest Batchelder in his newly organized Art School, which later became the now famous Batchelder Tile Works. Mrs. Chouinard was for a number of years a valued teacher in the Otis Art Institute. It was due to its rapid growth and the lack of space for new students in this institute that prompted Mrs. Chouinard to establish the Chouinard School, and the success achieved by the new school has justified the confidence of the founder of the need of a school where earnest students may progress as rapidly as their ability permits. Not only does the school provide for the best instruction, but it conducts a monthly exhibition of the work of prominent artists, open to the public as well as the students. This has a remarkable educational value to the student mind, and helps to bring them in close touch with the work of painters of accomplishment.
The school is not endowed, but depends upon its tuition for its support, as does the Art Students League of New York City. The rapid growth of Los Angeles, with its interesting group of thinking people, demands educational centers of unusual standards to hold its students in California.
The purpose of the school is to train students in the Fine Arts, as well as in the many practiced branches of the work. The business world is using fine examples of art work at the present time, and in this field art value in advertising is coming more and more in demand. To prepare the students to meet this demand they must be thoroughly trained in the Fine Arts as well as in the practical side of the work, and it is the work of each instructor to build this foundation in a balanced way.
The faculty is composed of artists prominent in their special branch of the work.
F. Tolles Chamberlain, instructor in life and painting, is a Fellow in the American Academy in Rome, a man of experience and one of the most constructive life teachers on the Pacific Coast.
Douglas Donaldson, craftsman of international reputation and member of the California Art Club, instructs in the design and design application.
Clarence K. Hinkle, painter and member of the California Art Club, is the instructor in landscape and evening life classes.
H. C. Frost, interior decoration department, is a man of European training and experience, as well as years of work in our leading American Decorating Establishments.
Sibil Eliza Jones and Egbert Pettey, stage directors and art directors in the Pasadena Community Childrens Plays, direct the stage craft and production classes.
The Commercial Art Classes are conducted by Mrs. Chouinard and a group of artists in the advertising field. Evening classes are open to business people and Saturday classes, for children as well as adults.
Mrs. Nelbert Murphy Chouinard was born at Montevideo, Minnesota, but moved to Minneapolis at an early age, and there she received in the public schools her early education. As previously noted, she pursued there-
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after the study of art in New York City. Her husband, Horace A. Chouinard, was for eleven years chaplain in the United States Army, and died in September, 1918. He was one of the first Army Chaplains to introduce the moving pictures for the men and also athletics, and was much beloved by the officers and men of his regiment.
MAJ. CHARLES C. DE RUDIO. When on November 1, 1910, Maj. Charles C. De Rudio answered the call of the Death Angel at Los Angeles there passed away as brave a spirit and as courageous and worthy a soldier as ever defended a flag. From the time of his birth, in a little Italian town near Venice, seventy-eight years before, his had been the life of a soldier.
Educated for his appointed calling in a military school in Austria, Major De Rudio was an aide on the staff of the great Garibaldi before he had arrived at his twentieth year. At barely twenty-five he was one of the nine chosen by the ill-fated Felice Orsini for the revolutionary coup planned against the life of Napoleon III at Paris June 18, 1858. His comrades guillotined and himself under sentence of death, young De Rudio calmly smoked a cigar and patiently awaited his own end. At the last moment a messenger arrived post haste to halt the impending execution with a royal pardon from the hand of the Empress Eugenie herself, nerved to clemency by the intercession of no less a personage than Queen Victoria of England. Six years later, called by the world-resounding din of civil strife in the United States, De Rudio came to this country and landed at Key West in February, 1864. He had scarely put foot on the soil of his adopted country when he was stricken with a terrible plague, but after having been quaran- tined for months hurried to the nearest Federal recruiting station and enlisted as a private in Company A, Seventy-ninth New York Infantry.
Although the four years of warfare were at that time nearly over, Major De Rudio managed to make himself a conspicuous figure in the en- gagements of the armies of Sheridan and Grant during the closing months of the struggle. His bravery was so manifest that he was chosen for hazardous missions, and in every case he vindicated the faith reposed in him. On one occasion he was sent on a dare-devil dash through the Confederate lines, carrying a message of great moment which was written on cigarette papers and rolled in a capsule which he carried in his mouth. Although repeatedly fired upon and near capture a dozen times, he passed through unscathed and completed his mission successfully. For this and other acts of bravery he was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Regular Army by General Grant, and, mustered out in 1866, he was reappointed to the Second Infantry in the following year.
After spending some time with the Second Infantry at Nashville, Ten- nessee, and Ash Barracks, Kentucky, Lieutenant De Rudio was transferrel to the Seventh Cavalry, and with that famous regiment was ordered to Fort Lincoln at the time of the Indian uprising in Dakota, where he so distinguished himself in the engagement against Sitting Bull's warriors that he was made a first lieutenant. At the time of the bloody massacre on the Little Big Horn, when Custer anl his entire command were wiped out, Lieutenant De Rudio was in command of a part of the left wing, under Major Reno. When his commanding officer gave the order to retreat Lieutenant De Rudio did not hear it, and though his men were deserting him on every side he called to them to stand their ground, and, wheeling his horse, dashed back to the entrenchments to save the "Troop Guidon." His mount was shot while under him, but he grasped the guidon and crawled away into the bushes, accompanied only by Sergeant O'Neil. For fifty hours the two men lay in hiding, without food or water, and escaped only by a miracle to later rejoin the remnant of their regiment after days of hiding and nights of desperate travel.
Lieutenant De Rudio was advanced to a captaincy in 1882 and was with the Seventh Cavalry on its memorable march from Fort Yates in Dakota to Fort Sill in Oklahoma, in the stirring days when the Indian territory was first thrown open. He saw active service at Fort Riley in Kansas, at Fort
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Sam Houston in Texas, and at Fort Bayard in New Mexico, and retired from active service a few months after his transfer to the latter post, in 1896. With his family he removed to San Diego in the same year, and in 1898 took up his residence at Los Angeles. In 1904 he was retired with the rank of major. Major De Rudio was a comrade of the Loyal Legion, a member of the Liberal Club and honorary president of practically every Italian organization in Los Angeles. He was known and loved for the soldierly courtesy and kindliness of his character.
Major De Rudio married Miss Eliza Booth, who was born at Godalming England, and they became the parents of four children : Hercules A., who is deceased ; Roma Elizabeth, who married H. C. Scott and has two chil- dren : Italia Louise, who married S. C. Adair and has a son, Samuel E., Jr .; and Carlotta Amelia, who married N. B. Vickery.
ALLEN CRAIG was a youth of nineteen years when he came to Califor- nia, and eventually he became one of the foremost and most influential figures in connection with the oil-producing industry in this state, his having been the distincton of being the first oil producer in the now cele- brated Fullerton oil fields.
Mr. Craig was a native of the State of New York, where he was born in the year 1865, of Scotch lineage, and he was a child at the time of the family removal to Pennsylvania, where his father, Robert Craig, became a pioneer operator in the oil fields. Allen Craig worked his own way through high school and also depended upon his own resources while attending college, during one year, his early education having been gained in the public schools near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In the old Keystone State he gained his initial experience in connection with oil production, and when, at the age of nineteen years, he came to California "to see the country," he found the lure of this state so great that he here established his permanent residence. Here his first work in the oil fields was done in Pico Canyon, nine miles west of Newhall, and he then went to Coalings, where he drilled the first oil well. Fully thirty years ago Mr. Craig returned to Los Angeles and engaged in independent contracting in connection with the opening of the local oil fields. The Garbut home property was the site of the first oil well in this district. Mr. Craig became successful as a contractor in the drilling of wells, at a time when such work entailed but a fraction of the cost of the present day. He was a director of the Consolidated Crude Oil Company ; which bought up many leases, and was one of the organizers of the Fullerton Oil Company. In the meanwhile he continued drilling opera- tions in various places, including Olinda, the first productive field. There- after his operations centered largely in the Fullerton fields, where he became prominently identified with the Fullerton Oil Company, as a stockholder, director and general manager. In the meanwhile he disposed of his interests in the Consolidated Crude Oil Company. In his various interests he was closely associated with W. L. Valentine, Henry W. O'Melveny and William Ball.
Mr. Craig invented many tools and machines for simplifying and mak- ing less expensive the production of oil, and one device invented and pat- ented by him does a work that formerly required several machines. On his inventions he obtained patents in 1904 and 1907, and the devices are now extensively used in oil fields in all parts of the Union. For his com- pany he located oil wells in Wyoming at the time of the stampede to that state.
The great outdoors had much of attraction for this vital and buoyant man, and he was a devotee of all manner of athletic sports, as well as hunt- ing and fishing. He was an automobile enthusiast, and incidentally took great interest in the good-roads movement, this interest having been shown in the effective work which he did in the improving of roads through this section of the state. He and Judge Federickson were the first to drive an automobile up the grade to Big Bear Lake, this achievement having been recorded May 10, 1908. The party which made this exploit was organized
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