History of Los Angeles county, Volume III, Part 61

Author: McGroarty, John Steven, 1862-1944
Publication date: 1923
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 844

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J. Waring

HISTORY OF LOS ANGELES COUNTY

Los Angeles and is now a popular teacher in the Junior High School at Corona. Helen E., who was born in January, 1900, died in February, 1916.

JOHN L. WARING, president of the State Bank of Owensmouth, is one of the astute and sagacious financiers of long experience, who is using his knowledge and good judgment to advantage in his business, and is holding the confidence of his home community. He was born at Bluffton, Indiana, February 4, 1871, and attended its public schools. Entering the Studa- baker Bank at Bluffton in a clerical capacity, Mr. Waring rose first to be teller, and later assistant cashier.

Severing his connections with his home city bank, Mr. Waring went to Mesa, Arizona, to take charge of the Mesa City Bank, and served as its president until his health failed and he was forced to seek another climate better suited to him. For a time he was engaged in ranching, and then, in 1914, came to Owensmouth as cashier and manager of the State Bank of Owensmouth, and later was made its president. He has other interests and is a member of the Board of Directors of the Owensmouth Bean Growers Association. Ever since coming here he has been an active mem- ber of the Owensmouth Chamber of Commerce. Fraternally he maintains membership with the Masonic Order, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the Knights of Pythias and the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. In the Masonic fraternity he has risen through the different bodies of the Scottish and York Rites, and belongs to the Commandery and Consistory of Tucson, Arizona, and the Mystic Shrine of Phoenix, Arizona.

In 1896 Mr. Waring married Miss Mary Arnold, of Bluffton, Indiana, and they have two children: Frank, who is a student of the University of California; and Henry C., who is attending the Owensmouth High School.

Mr. and Mrs. Waring are both active members of the Methodist Episcopal Church of Owensmouth, and Mr. Waring is a member of the Board of Trustees and is also treasurer of the church.

The State Bank of Owensmouth was established October 3, 1914, with the following representative business men as its Board of Directors : M. H. Sherman, W. P. Whitsett, F. X. Pfaffinger, S. O. Houghton, Junior, L. E. Bliss, R. E. Whitley, George W. Burch, A. I. Smith, O. J. Wigdal, J. W. Ketchum, George Hanna, W. T. Hopper, R. J. Wigdal, H. J. Whitley, A. T. Brant, Harry Chandler, R. P. Sherman, George W. Scott, L. E. Rankin, and R. S. Padget. The first officers were: R. E. Whitley. president; M. H. Sherman, vice president; A. I. Smith, vice president ; H. J. Whitley, vice president ; O. J. Wigdal, vice president ; R. S. Padget; cashier, and R. J. Wigdal, assistant cashier. The bank is capitalized at $50,000, with surplus and undivided profits of $2,700, and deposits of $350,000. The building occupied by the bank is owned by it, and it is at the corner of Sherman and Remmet streets. It is a thoroughly modern and substantial building, beautifully finished, with inverted electric lights, and elegant bank fixtures and furniture. The safety deposit vault is large with eighty-five boxes, and guarded by the latest improved safety devices. The bank occupies the lower floor, but rents the upper floor for office purposes, principally to professional men for offices. In 1922 the policy of the bank was changed so as to have fifteen members on the directorate, they being now as follows: A. L. Smith, A. T. Brant, J. L. Waring, Frank Goodall, George Hanna, Lewis E. Bliss, F. X. Pfaffinger, M. H. Sherman, S. O. Houghton, Samuel Dickson, C. C. Barclay, R. L. Hender- son, M. C. McDougall, Perry Mulholland and W. E. Bechtelheimer. The present officers are: J. L. Waring, president; M. H. Sherman, C. C. Barclay, F. X. Pfaffinger, and M. C. McDougall, vice presidents ; and R. L. Henderson, cashier.

THOMAS JEFFERSON CANNON. Oil men and financiers all over the Southwest have a very high appreciation not only for the business integrity

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and efficiency, but the personal character of Thomas Jefferson Cannon, formerly of Kansas City, now of Long Beach, head of the T. J. Cannon Drilling and Supply Company, Incorporated. Mr. Cannon has come up from the ranks and knows perhaps as well as any man the value of a dollar measured in terms of manual toil.

He was born in Southern Kentucky in the foothills of the Cumberland Mountains, August 18, 1874, son of John F. and Catherine Louise (McLean) Cannon, who died when he was about eleven years old. His father was a native of Virginia and his mother of North Carolina, and his father was a tobacco planter. His ancestors came from Ireland, while on his mother's side Mr. Cannon is of Scotch ancestry. John F. Cannon served as a Confederate soldier in a Tennessee regiment, going in as a private and coming out a sergeant and was once wounded in battle. There were five sons and three daughters in the family, and two sons and one daughter are living, Tom, being the only one in California, and the young- est of the eight. .

His associates speak admiringly of Mr. Cannon's resourcefulness and mastery of circumstances, and many of them are surprised to know that all his education so far as schools were concerned was acquired by two terms of two months each in country schools of Kentucky. After the death of his parents he was reared by an aunt and uncle, but he soon left home in fascination for the circus, and for fifteen years he was contracting agent for the big railroad tented shows. He has been around the world three times, and was with all the big railroad shows except Ringlings.

After this experience so full of travel and adventure, he got into the oil game, beginning "as a roughneck on a rotary rig" in Calcasieu Parish in Louisiana, being paid $1.75 a day for a twelve hour day work on a derrick platform. For several years past Mr. Cannon has paid $7 and $8 day to his men who worked eight hours at the same kind of labor he performed in the St. Charles oil district of Louisiana. Mr. Cannon has been actively engaged in the oil well drilling industry ever since. He brought in his first big well at Edgerly, Louisiana, in 1907. For the past eight years he has been a drilling contractor. During his drilling experience he has spent nearly $900,000 drilling on his own account twenty-three wild cat wells, every one of them as dry as a feather duster. With the amount of acreage around these twenty-three wells, all the way from 7,500 to 30,000 acres, a single producing well or oil field would have brought him a fortune any- where from $10,000,000 to $50,000,000. While he sank a large fortune in his individual operations, his business as a driller has brought in many remarkable fields for others. Though on the losing side as an independent driller, Mr. Cannon has a notable reputation, one testified to by Chambers of Commerce and prominent bankers all over the Southwest, as a driller who has lived up to his contract in every particular and has taken his losses with equanimity, to the injury of himself, but not of others. His drilling operations have been conducted in the Oklahoma fields, in Kansas, Texas and Louisiana, and in 1914 he established his headquarters in Kansas City, and was there for seven years. In the fall of 1922 he located at Long Beach, and organized the T. J. Cannon Drilling and Supply Company, Incorporated, of which he is president and general manager. It is his hope and intention to remain the balance of his life along the shores of the Pacific Ocean. The T. J. Cannon Drilling and Supply Company has drilled in some of the large fields of Southern California, and since being estab- lished the demand for its service and facilities has been greater than could be supplied.

As one of the prominent oil men of Los Angeles County Mr. Cannon took an active part in organizing the Petroleum Commercial Club of Long Beach, of which he is president. This club is limited to 1,000 members, and comprises the first prominent organization of the kind in the country. The club is planning a fine clubhouse, and Mr. Cannon has been voted Suite 1 in the club when it is completed and will live there since he is a bachelor. He chose life membership No. 13 in the Petroleum Club.

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Unlike many practical oil men Mr. Cannon is absolutely without supersti- tion, and has never shown any fear for No. 13, black cats, blue Fridays, white mules, red and black or cross-eyed niggers or walking underneath ladders. In the world of sportsmanship Mr. Cannon will be recalled as the man who discovered the prowess of Jess Willard, the former heavy weight champion. Mr. Cannon is a democrat in politics, a member of the Catholic Church, and is affiliated with Lodge No. 9, Benevolent and Pro- tective Order of Elks at St. Louis, Missouri, and the Oklahoma City Council of the Knights of Columbus. He is a charter member of the Show- man's League of America.

VOORHEESE C. ALLEN, of V. C. Allen & Company, real estate and fire insurance at San Pedro, has been in business there twenty years, and deserves all the honorable distinctions that belong to a real community builder. Mr. Allen did some of the first work connected with the physical improvement of the land now in the townsite of San Pedro. Through all the years he has maintained a policy of watchfulness with respect to subse- quent improvements, and more than once has safeguarded the community against extravagance or ill considered plans that would have interfered with the orderly and prosperous development of the city. As a member of various business and civic organizations, and frequently as his own initiative and at his own expense he has put himself into the fight for civic progress. No one has done more than Mr. Allen to clean up San Pedro morally, getting rid of the undesirable element that infested the harbor town in its early years. It has been his permanent home, the place where his chil- dren have grown up, and Mr. Allen has exercised the same consideration for others that originated in his desire for the welfare of his own.

Mr. Allen was born September 25, 1873, near the Village of Palmer in Christian County, Illinois, but in his early infancy his parents removed from the farm to the village. He is a descendant of Epherun Allen, the leader of the Green Mountain Boys who captured Port Ticonderoga at the opening of the Revolutionary war. His grandfather Jesse Joblin Allen was born in the State of Maryland in 1812 and married Millard Jane Small, who was born on a farm near Rockfish and Nelson County, Virginia, in 1819. Jesse J. Allen had three full brothers, Landern C., William and James, and a half brother George. Jesse Allen with his family drove from Virginia to Illinois with an ox team in 1850 and settled on a farm on Bear Creek in Christian County near the home of William Calvin Crail. Among his children was John T. Allen, who was born June 2, 1838, on a farm three miles Northwest of Staunton, Augusta County, Virginia. John T. was twelve years old when the family moved to Illinois. He early became acquainted with the daughter of William Calvin Crail, Parthenia Crail, who was born November 2, 1841, in Magoupin County, Illinois, and was five years of age when her parents moved to the farm in Christian County. She became the wife of John T. Allen, October 23, 1859. Her parents were William C. and Susan (Whiteworth) Crail, the former a native of Chris- tian County, Kentucky, and the latter of Madison County, Illinois. John T. Allen and wife had eleven children; six daughters and five sons.

V. C. Allen was reared at Palmer, Illinois, where his father was in the live stock business, buying and shipping horses, cattle, sheep and hogs to Chicago, St. Louis, and also to England. V. C. Allen inherited a love of the country, and soon as old enough he spent his summer vacations on his uncle's farm. At the age of thirteen he was trying cowboy stunts, such as springing on a horse without saddle or bridle and throwing the lariat over other horses in a herd. On one occasion the rope fell over a spirited young horse, and as he had no saddle horn by which to secure the rope, relying upon holding it with his hand he was pulled from his horse and thrown heavily on the ground, so that all the ribs on the right side were broken from the spine, this crippling him for life. At the age of fifteen he secured an old horse and buggy, secured a stock of notions and wares from St. Louis and Chicago, and started out through the country selling to farmers. By

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the time he was seventeen he was able to buy a team and wagon, and he continued this itinerant merchandising for some time. He also owned and conducted the first confectionery store and restaurant at Palmer. This business he traded for a house and two lots, and then resumed his inter- rupted educational advantages. Following that he was in the grocery business, but this proved somewhat disastrous because he had extended too liberal credit to his customers and was unable to collect. For a year he was in Denver, Colorado, trying to recruit his broken health, spent a few weeks in Salt Lake City, and in November, 1901, arrived at Los Angeles. Soon afterward he hired out to the contractors French, Thurber . & Goucher, who were doing a large business as excavators. His first employment was in laying a private sewer in Long Beach for a laundry, and a gas plant on Alameda Avenue. He also assisted in grading Daisy Avenue of Long Beach, and he had charge of laying the first steel rails for the Pacific Electric Railroad inside the city limits of Long Beach on American Avenue.

In July, 1902, Mr. Allen came to San Pedro as foreman in charge of the grading of Fifth and Sixth streets. Ever since his permanent interests have been identified with San Pedro, though he did not move his family from Long Beach here at first owing to the rough element who occupied the waterfront at San Pedro. At that time there was a great deal of disorder and many times a murder committed within the limits of San Pedro. On the first day of February, 1903, Mr. Allen opened his real estate, fire insurance and loan office, and has now been in business con- tinuously for twenty years. Probably as no one else in the city he has under- stood and appreciated the wonderful opportunities here, and his long experi- ence, his knowledge and his reputation for fair dealing, have brought him a great volume of business and a host of friends.

In 1903-04 a number of San Pedro citizens organized a local political party called the good government party. Mr. Allen joined them, and was one of the most influential of its members in driving out and curbing the wide open town element. For a number of years thereafter, as the files of the local papers show, Mr. Allen was on committees or in other ways con- nected with every concerted movement to break up organized vice and also to frustrate the teams of unscrupulous men looking for their profits only and not the permanent advantage of the city. Those in a position to judge say that the greatest growth of prosperity of San Pedro have resulted directly from this clean government movement in which Mr. Allen has been so important a factor.

Mr. Allen on reaching his majority, at the earnest desire of his father voted the democratic ticket, but always since then has been a republican in politics. About the time he reached his majority he was a candidate for the city council in the Town of Palmer, Illinois, and lacked only three votes of being elected. Some thought he was too young for the office, and that opinion was shared by Mr. Allen himself, and consequently he cast a vote for his rival. Back in Illinois he united with the Christian Advent Church of Palmer, but while in Colorado was associated with the Methodist, and in Long Beach and in San Pedro has been affiliated as a Baptist. The family are members of the Baptist Church at San Pedro.

On February 22, 1906, at Los Angeles, at the home of Mr. Allen's mother, he married Miss Ellen Olson. She was born in Muskegon, Mich- igan, but since the age of five years has lived in San Pedro, and was educated here. She is an active member of the Woman's Club of San Pedro. The two children of Mr. and Mrs. Allen, both born in San Pedro and now attending the San Pedro High School, are Healer Voorheese and Niaggres Inez Nina Allen. It will be observed that the initials of the daughter's name spell Nina.

EDWARD THOMAS HARDEN. A strong and noble personality was that of this talented and honored citizen of Los Angeles, where his death occurred February 26, 1923, the ultimate result of an attack of influenza

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complicated with pneumonia. Mr. Harden was long and actively identified with business affairs in California, but to those who were his intimates he was best known for his splendid literary taste and ability, especially as shown in his poetical writings, which were of classical diction and invari- able beauty of sentiment, indicative of his profound scholarship.

A scion of the patrician old Colonial American stock in the South, Mr. Harden was born in the City of Savannah, Georgia, on the 11th of October, 1853, a son of Judge Edward Jenkins Harden and Sophia Harden. A number of his ancestors were patriot soldiers in the War of the Revolu- tion, and his deep appreciation of this fact was significantly shown when he became one of the foremost in effecting the organization of the Cali- fornia Society of the Sons of the Revolution, he having held various official positions in this patriotic organization and having been its secretary for many years prior to his death. In the period of the Civil war his father held judicial office under the Confederate States government, and a price was placed upon his head by the Federal authorities, owing to his activities in behalf of the Confederate cause. The subject of this memoir was a lad at the inception of the Civil war and witnessed much of the strife and tur- bulent stages on the soil of his native state, he having seen the entrance of the victorious forces of General Sherman into Savannah and having remem- bered the various searches that were made in an effort to apprehend his honored father. Notwithstanding the depressed conditions in the South after the close of the war Mr. Harden was not denied good educational advantages during the so-called reconstruction period. His initial experi- ence in connection with practical affairs was gained in connection with the insurance and the cotton business in his native state. He also studied law and gained admission to the bar of Georgia.

Mr. Harden continued his residence in Georgia until September, 1889, when, as a young man of about thirty-six years, he came to California. He arrived about the time of the collapse of the remarkable boom that had given impetus to all of Southern California,business, and all business here was at low ebb, with the result that he finally went to the mines and took employment as a regular miner. Later he was associated with A. B. Benton, architect and builder, who designed and built the beautiful Mission Inn at Riverside, besides erecting many other artistic and noteworthy buildings in Southern California.

In addition to being the prime mover in the organization of the Cali- fornia Society of the Sons of the Revolution, Mr. Harden also organized the California Society of Colonial Wars, he having been the official historian for both of these organizations at the time of his death. He was made a life member of Landrum Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, in his native City of Savannah, and he was affiliated with the patriotic organiza- tion in New York City known as the Order of Washington. He was long active and influential in the councils of the democratic party in Cali- fornia, and in this connection it may be noted that both he and his wife when children were neighbors of the family of Woodrow Wilson, the childhood friendship having matured with the passing years and both Mr. and Mrs. Harden having continued warm personal friends of the former president of the United States. When on the western tour which brought the lamentable break in his physical powers President Wilson took occasion to call upon his old friends at their home at 2331 Thompson Street, Los Angeles.

In December, 1879, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Harden and Miss Isabel Elizabeth Porter, daughter of the late Rev. David H. Porter, of Savannah, Georgia, her father having been a distinguished clergyman of the First Presbyterian Church. Mrs. Harden survives her honored husband and continues to reside in her home in Los Angeles. The one surviving child Isabel, is the wife of Norman D. Bishop, of Los Angeles, and they have three children, Elizabeth, Edward Harden and Jane Porter.

Mr. Harden was not only a man of scholarly attainments but was also possessed of a fine and well trained baritone voice. His services were in

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demand in church choirs of representative order, as well as in connection with other musical affairs. Mr. Harden from early manhood was a member of the Presbyterian Church. He was the author of many poems of high literary and sentimental value, and in this brief memoir it is possible to reproduce only two of these. For this purpose is selected the poem written by Mr. Harden in September, 1914, immediately after President Wilson's proclamation for a national day of prayer, the production bearing title taken from the Book of Jeremiah, 8-11, "Saying Peace, Peace, When There is no Peace."

We cry Peace, Peace, when there is no peace- Nor can there be while men and nations, sway'd by greed, Follow the false, unhallow'd creed that "Might is always right." For just so long as this false creed shall hold,

And men and nations lust for gold,

The oppressor and oppress'd must fight.

We cry Peace, Peace, when there is no peace.

Yet peace may come when man gives unto man his due-

Each doing as he'd have the other do-

That wondrous law of love.

When this shall come, all wars and strifes shall cease,

And this old world have perfect peace-

The Peace of Heavenly love.

Another poem is entitled :

INTROSPECTION "QUID HODIE FECI?"

The sun gone down, the twilight's gathering gloom, give warning that today has almost gone. While I, in introspective mood, this question ask, - "Today, what have I done?"

Have I done aught, some deed of wrong, an act of which I would not speak ? Yet thought of which in this calm hour brings shame's hot blood to either cheek.

Have I been so engrossed in self as not to see the beggar's hand outstretched in mute appeal, nor stay, To raise some frail one fallen by my side or lead the blind across the crowded way ?

Have I been guilty of some thoughtless word that wounded deep some heart as tender as my own ? Or flaunted in the face of others things they did not have and thus the seed of envy sown ?

Have I by tongue or pen help'd spread the poison that exudes from Gossip's evil tongue ? Or have I tried to stay its deadly course and calm'd some heart it had with anguish wrung?

Have I been honest with my fellow man and given each the all that was his due ? Have I kept faith with God and man and thereby to myself been true ?

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These questions, though they seem so many, are but varying forms all comprehended in the one The first I ask'd, in this reflective hour, "Today, what have I done?"

Today is almost gone, 'twill soon be past and should I live, tomorrow will become today, So praying henceforth only good to do, I leave the bad upon the wreck strewn shore of yesterday.

CHARLES J. COLDEN, subdivider and builder, realty investment, of San Pedro, has been one of the energetic business leaders of Los Angeles for a number of years. He is a member of the Los Angeles Planning Com- mission, and has been president of the San Pedro Chamber of Commerce.

Mr. Colden before coming to California was a successful newspaper man in Missouri and had also for several years been in the real estate busi- ness at Kansas City. He was born on Spoon River in Spring Valley, Peoria County, Illinois, August 24, 1870, son of John W. and Hattie (Gingrich) Colden. His parents moved to Nodaway County, Missouri, in 1880, and both died there, the father on September 16, 1922, at the age of seventy-five and the mother February 15, 1911. John W. Colden was of Scotch ancestry, was a native of Indiana, and his wife was Pennsylvania Dutch and born in Ohio. John W. Colden twice enlisted for service in the Union army during the Civil war. He was a young boy when he first went in and after a little over a year his father secured his release from the army. By his reenlistment he served a year and a half. He was in Com- pany I, of the One Hundred and Fortieth Indiana Infantry, and among other campaigns was with Sherman on the March to Sea. He was never wounded, but ill health in later years was largely traced to hardships and exposures of army life. He devoted his years to farming. He had two children, Charles J. and a daughter, Mrs. Brice C. Hall, who still occupies the old homestead in Missouri.

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History of Los Angeles county, Volume III, Part 61

Author: McGroarty, John Steven, 1862-1944 Publication date: 1923 Publisher: Number of Pages: 844

Author: McGroarty, John Steven, 1862-1944
Publication date: 1923
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 844