USA > California > Mendocino County > History of Mendocino and Lake counties, California, with biographical sketches of the leading, men and women of the counties who have been identified with their growth and development from the early days to the present > Part 73
USA > California > Lake County > History of Mendocino and Lake counties, California, with biographical sketches of the leading, men and women of the counties who have been identified with their growth and development from the early days to the present > Part 73
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MOORE & BACON .- The gentlemen comprising the firm of Moore & Bacon, proprietors of the meat market at Lakeport, are both in the prime of manhood and possess a very correct knowledge of the wants of their customers, in whose interests they devote their best energies to the securing of first- class grades of beef, pork and mutton, and to the maintenance of a modern and model sanitary equipment in both the shop and the slaughter yard. The Cyclops refrigerator system in the market is unsurpassed in general arrange- ment and convenience as well as from the standpoint of sanitation. It is the aim of the proprietors to give every customer courteous attention, full weight, perfect quality of meat and a square deal in every respect, and so well have they succeeded in their aim that it is said no shop in California sells finer meats than can be found here. This is due not only to their care in the buy- ing of stock, but also to the fact that they personally superintend the fat- tening of the cattle from October to April and thus finish off a carload or more of beeves of exceptional merit. At the same time they fatten each year from seventy-five to one hundred head of sheep and these they slaughter for sale in their market. By following this rule of personal selection and fattening of all stock, they secure for customers meats of known quality from animals invariably fat and healthy. Ample capital enables the firm to conduct their business on a cash basis and with a view to future needs, so that they are able to buy at more attractive figures and thus give the customers the advantage of rates greatly appreciated in these days of exorbitantly-priced meats.
BURT G. SAYRE .- The hardware business which Mr. Sayre purchased from George H. Foree in 1907 and which has been established for thirty years, represents an investment of about $20,000 and occupies a central location on Main street, where a two-story building, 30x100 feet in dimensions, is stocked with a complete assortment of hardware, stoves, tinware, pumps, plumbing supplies, agricultural implements, paints and oils, glass, lime and cement, tin, copper and zinc as well as all kinds of sheet iron. Customers are surprised at the completeness of the stock and the energy expended in securing modern supplies of every assortment. A specialty is made of sani- tary plumbing and the trade in that line is extensive. Orders are taken and filled for tanks of every desired material. Anything in the sheet-metal line is built to order and the proprietor is busily engaged in meeting the needs of his growing list of customers and in keeping up-to-date his stock in the business establishment, besides superintending supplies in storehouse and warehouse, and endeavoring to promptly fill orders sent in by customers.
Mr. Sayre, who has been a resident of Lakeport since eleven years of age, was born at Denison, Crawford county, Iowa, March 20, 1875, and is a son of Hon. Morton S. Sayre, judge of the superior court of Lake county and president of the Bank of Lake. His recollections of his mother, Della (Genung) Sayre, are vague and indistinct, for he was too young at her death to realize
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what the loss of her affectionate care would mean to him in boyhood. He was nine when brought by his father to Middletown, Lake county, and two years later he entered the Lakeport public schools, from which he was pro- moted in due time to the academy. From eighteen until twenty-one he served an apprenticeship in the Union iron works at San Francisco. During the summer of 1897 he joined the great rush to the Klondike, where he traveled the length and breadth of the gold mines, only to suffer the loss of his all, so that, penniless and among strangers, he was obliged to walk eight hundred miles out on the ice, finally working his way back to San Francisco. Such a terrible experience, however, did not weaken his faith in gold mines and during the excitement at Tonopah and Goldfield he joined in the rush to Nevada, where he was more successful than in the Klondike. Upon his re- turn to Lakeport he bought the business he now conducts with such efficiency and intelligence. In 1907 he married Miss Lela Mitchell, an earnest worker in the Lakeport Baptist Church. Fraternally he holds membership with the Odd Fellows and Masons at Lakeport. Enthusiastic in regard to the future of Lake county and with a firm faith in its adaptability for certain crops, he has started a walnut orchard of fifteen acres within the incorporated limits, selecting walnuts because he believes with Luther Burbank that the soil and climate of Lake county are admirably adapted to the successful production of the English variety of that nut.
GEORGE E. MORRISON .- Several members of the Morrison family are living within a few miles north of the village of Upper Lake, and the old Morrison homestead on the east side of Clear lake is still occupied by a son of the founder of the family in the Upper Lake region of Lake county, the late Samuel L. Morrison, who lived here for forty-six years and was one of its most esteemed pioneer settlers. The brothers George E. and William S. Morrison some years ago were engaged in steamboating on Clear lake, and have all their lives been active in the business affairs of this section, main- taining a high reputation for trustworthiness and reliability.
Samuel L. Morrison was a Scotchman by birth, and had the sterling characteristics of his race. Coming to the United States when a young man, he made the trip to California from Maine in 1854, and first went to the mines in the vicinity of Marysville, cooking for the miners. But he found his fortune in land and its cultivation. The year 1857 found him in Lake county, where he took up one hundred and sixty acres on the east shore of Clear lake which has since been known as the Morrison homestead, Mr. Morrison living there from that time until his death, which occurred in 1903, when he was seventy-seven years of age. In the course of his long and industrious life he became a large landowner, buying property in the vicinity as opportunity offered until he had acquired fourteen hundred acres in one body-all on the east side of Clear lake. He prospered at farming, and owned the steamboat Kitty Kelly, a stern-wheeler fifty-five feet long, with a nine-foot beam, which his sons ran on Clear lake, principally in the freight service. Mr. Morrison's home was in the East Upper Lake precinct, and no resident of the neighbor- hood was more highly respected. With the appreciation of land values as the country became settled and its possibilities apparent, he found himself a wealthy man. after a life whose chief ambition had been to rear his family in comfort and to the habits of right living necessary to make them good citi- zens. His name is honored wherever known.
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On July 4, 1861, Mr. Morrison married Miss Fannie L. Carpenter, who was born June 7, 1844, near Troy, N. Y., one of the four children of Silas and Sabra (Eddy) Carpenter, farming people, both also natives of near Troy, N. Y. They were married in that state and their children were all born there. Thence the family removed to Jefferson county, Mo., when Mrs. Morrison was an infant, and her father dying of typhoid fever shortly afterward she has no recollection of him. She crossed the plains to California with her mother and brother and sisters in 1860, the family settling on a farm in the Upper Lake country, and her marriage to Mr. Morrison took place the following year. Her mother remarried, her second husband being a Mr. Elliott, and she died about a year after this marriage. Of the four children born to her first union, Elizabeth, the widow of Robert Henderson, died in 1911 at Los Angeles; Sarah Jane, who died in Clover Creek valley, Lake county, in 1899, was the wife of Matthew Johnson, who is a farmer; John died in Los Angeles, unmar- ried ; Fannie L. is the widow of Samuel L. Morrison.
Seven children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Samuel L. Morrison : Mary H., married to B. Frank Henry, a farmer of Lake county; George E. of Upper Lake; William S., living in the East Upper Lake precinct, two and a half miles north of Upper Lake; John C., who died when twenty-four years old; Elsie, deceased; Frederick L., living on the Morrison homestead place, a large landowner of his section of Lake county ; and Andrew, deceased. After her husband's death Mrs. Morrison bought the property of eight acres on Middle creek in Upper Lake precinct where she now resides, having a com- fortable home near her sons George and William, two and a half miles north of Upper Lake. She is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Upper Lake. Beloved by her children and the scores of friends she has made during her long residence in Lake county, she has an enviable position among the most esteemed people of the community.
George E. Morrison was born on his father's homestead place on the cast side of Clear lake February 15, 1864, and passed all his early life there. His father's large property gave the sons plenty of opportunity for acquir- ing business experience, and besides gaining a familiar knowledge of the work and management necessary in carrying on agricultural operations he engaged in another line in which the Morrisons have been well known, steamboating on Clear lake. His father owned the Kitty Kelly, as above stated, and the sons George and William ran her in partnership for a period of five years, principally in freighting to and from the quicksilver mines at Sulphur Banks. They found this venture very profitable. George E. Morrison also ran the freight steamer East Lake in this service for some time. Now, however, his attention is devoted chiefly to the management of his land, which is in two bodies, his home property of seventy-one acres lying one mile north of Upper Lake, along the Middle Creek road, and the other tract, which com- prises four hundred acres, being on the east side of Clear Lake. He is exten- sively engaged in farming and alfalfa raising, and has made a success of agri- culture as he has of his other ventures. As a man of keen judgment in finan- cial matters his opinions are sought and respected by all who have had deal- ings with him. He is a typical representative of the name he bears, notably successful in business, yet never sacrificing his principles or lowering his reputation by engaging in any transaction which could reflect upon his honor or carry any suspicion of unfairness. Politically he supports the Republican party.
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Mr. Morrison's marriage, which took place in 1900, was to Miss Lena Belle Male, of Lakeport, Lake county, whose advice and co-operation have aided him greatly in the conduct of all his affairs. They are highly regarded in the neighborhood, personally as well as for the high standard of citizenship they uphold. Mr. and Mrs. Morrison have two children, Fannie and James.
NICHOLAS COCKING .- Splendid old English stock has furnished to Nicholas Cocking that stability of character which has evidenced itself throughout his career, designating him a strong man among men in that he has triumphed over difficulties and won success in spite of many hardships and trying conditions. He was born in Newquay, County Cornwall, Eng- land, December 11, 1864, the son of a large landowner there, William Cock- ing, who reared him to a farming life and afforded him good educational advantages. After leaving the public schools he eschewed a college course to assist his father, with whom he remained until 1889. For five years sub- sequent to his eighteenth birthday he served in the English Volunteers in Cornwall. It was in 1889 that he decided to follow his idea of casting his fortunes in the far west, and believing that there were opportunties here that could not be found in his native country, he made his way hither to find success even beyond his expectations. In Oxford county, Ontario, he spent two and a half months, and in July, 1889, came to Yolo county, Cal., where he entered the employ of the Stephens Brothers on their farms. In April, 1891, he came to Highland Springs, Lake county, for J. D. Stephens, as fore- man for him over the Highland Springs stables and ranch, continuing this position with steadfastness, honesty and such ability for six and a half years that his employers came to value him highly for his services. Resigning then, he resolved to engage in farming and stockraising on his own account, and in December, 1897, he rented the Stubbs ranch near Sulphur Bank mine, operating it with success for six years. He then purchased the old Paradise Valley ranch of twelve hundred acres on the east side of Clear lake, which he improved greatly, bringing it to a high state of cultivation. Stockraising was his principal industry, but a boom in land values occurring at this time he sold this place to R. M. Hotalling at a splendid profit. Finding the old Elledge ranch of twenty-eight hundred and eighty acres in Mendocino county for sale he purchased it, shortly after moving there, and he has followed ranching there ever since. Valuable improvements have been made, and he has purchased adjoining land until he now has thirty-five hundred acres, making in all one of the finest as well as largest stock ranches in the vicinity. The ranch is beautifully located in the mountains, nine miles from Ukiah, on the Boonville road and is well watered by streams and numerous large springs. One of these has a large flow and a part of the water from the spring is piped to the house and stockyards, as well as to a watering trough on the public highway, which happens to be the only drinking place for horses and stock between Ukiah and the summit the year round. As it is excellent mountain water it is much appreciated by the public throughout the com- munity.
With others Mr. Cocking has built a private, telephone line from the Ukiah line, and the improvements on his place include a comfortable resi- dence, garage and spacious barns. He is raising Durham cattle, Merino sheep and Poland China hogs, and is making a specialty of raising sheep, having usually a flock of about two thousand sheep. Aiming to get a more even and moderate grade on his place he gave five and a half miles of right of way for
Nicholas backing
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the highway through his ranch, and the result is that the road is now one of the best mountain roads in that part of the state.
Mr. Cocking was married to Miss Louise Frances Manlove, who was born in Big Valley, Lake county, the daughter of William Henry Manlove, a pioneer and first sheriff of Lake county. Another daughter of Mr. Manlove, Minnie Leona, married Frank W. Noel, in whose sketch in this volume a mention of Mr. Manlove will be found. Mr. Cocking was one of the original members of the Farmers' Club of Ukiah, and is still an active member. In 1eligion an Episcopalian, he takes a public-spirited interest in all that per- tains to his community's welfare, and politically votes the straight Democratic ticket.
CAPT. JAMES M. REID .- Prior to the outbreak of the Revolution there crossed the shores to the new world John Reid, a native of the Isle of Man and a member of an ancient family of the north of England and the south of Scotland whom the vicissitudes of fate had taken to the little island where he was born and reared. The new world with its unsettled prairies and vast opportunities appealed to his appreciation of opportunity and he reared his family in this country. Returning to Great Britain to visit the scenes of his youth, it is supposed that he was lost at sea on the return voyage to America, but the meager opportunities for tracing the happenings of that period prevented the family from learning definitely about his fate. Seth Barton Reid, who was born in Jefferson county, Ohio, in 1819, was reared by his maternal grandmother, the wife of Samuel Hooper, a signer of the decla- ration of independence. To learn a trade was the custom of that day. At the age of about fourteen he was bound out to a millwright at Mount Pleas- ant, Jefferson county, and on the expiration of his time he devoted himself to the occupation in various sections of country. Before leaving Ohio for the newer west he married Eleanor Rogers, a native of the Buckeye state and a daughter of William Penn Rogers, whose people were among the very earliest settlers of Maryland, but who became a pioneer of Ohio and aided in founding what is now the flourishing city of Marietta. The brave spirit which led him to conquer the difficulties of the frontier became an inheritance of his daugh- ter and led her, through the troubled era of the Rebellion, to defend herself and family with a shotgun, but could not prevent her from having to suffer great losses through the confiscation of cattle, wagons, horses, mules and, indeed, practically all of the equipment of the large southern farm. These losses occurred while the men of the family were bearing arms in the service of the Union, but no recompense was ever received for them.
It was about the year 1846 when the family removed from Ohio to In- diana, where the father built a mill at Aurora and where a daughter, Mary Lovinia (now deceased), was born. Next removal was made to Missouri, where the father again built mills at Jefferson City and St. Charles. The youngest child, Anna Eliza, was born at St. Charles; she died in 1893, leav- ing one son, Harold Deison, now a resident of Austin, Tex. After having built a mill at Pekin, Ill., Mr. Reid took his family back to Missouri and built a mill at Hannibal. In 1852 he became a pioneer of Texas and settled near Austin, where conditions were those of the frontier and where privations and discomfort abounded. At the time of locating near Austin the eldest child, James Madison, was eleven years of age. Under the conditions then existing it was impossible for him to attend school with any regularity, yet 33
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he is a man of broad information and in early life proved an apt pupil in the great school of experience. His assistance to his father proved invaluable. Together they raised cattle and horses, together they quarried rock and burned lime. On one occasion he was sent to the Austin schools for three months and that proved a very helpful period in extending his knowledge of the three R's.
As captain of a boy's regiment at Austin the young Texan gained his first training in military tactics. His birth had occurred in Morgan county, Ohio, May 26, 1841, and he was therefore twenty years of age at the outbreak of the Civil war. Although he had lived from boyhood in the south, he was of northern blood and sympathies and from the first espoused the cause of the Union, not an easy matter in the heart of a strongly Confederate section. In fact, every influence was brought to bear to secure him as a captain in the southern army, but he could not consent to fight against principles he be- lieved to be right. About fifteen young men joined with him in an effort to remain loyal to the Union, their leader being Hon. "Jack" Hamilton, ex- Governor of Texas and a former member of congress from that state. For three months they were refugees at a mountain retreat known as Bee Cave, from which they started out to find Union troops, July 2, 1862. The next night they camped at Lockhart, Tex., where they were joined by Captain Montgomery, an old Texas ranger. Traveling by night and resting by day, they came to within one hundred miles of the Rio Grande and met their first serious danger when members of a Confederate regiment demanded their passes. As Colonel Hamilton hastily replied, "American citizens do not have to carry passes," every man urged his horse to its greatest speed and this led to a running fight that only ended at the river. Fortunately the northern sympathizers found the Confederate Colonel's boat and in it the sixteen men crossed the Rio Grande into Mexico, their horses swimming across under a terrific fire from the soldiers. Their escape seemed little less than a miracle. Determined to intercept them, the Confederates sent a courier to the Mexican garrison at Mier, commanded by Colonel Garcia, and reported that a band of American robbers were coming down the river. A regiment of Mexican sol- diers at once intercepted the refugees. It happened that Governor Hamilton had entertained Colonel Garcia at his Austin home during his period of service as a member of congress and Garcia therefore entertained the most kindly feelings toward him, so was ready to extend not only hospitality, but also protection.
After a month of waiting and a detour of more than four hundred and forty miles to escape falling into the hands of Confederates, the refugees reached Matamoras at the mouth of the Rio Grande, and there they finally boarded a schooner that made its escape under fire of a Confederate transport. After twenty-eight days at sea they were overtaken by a United States blockade runner, and by orders of Admiral Farragut were escorted to New Orleans, whence ex-Governor Hamilton went to Washington to act as one of the southern advisers of President Lincoln. The remaining fifteen men reported to Gen. Benjamin F. Butler and were assigned to the First Texas Cavalry, with Mr. Reid as first lieutenant of Company B. For nine months he was commissioned by General Butler to act on night patrol duty as night officer. Later he was in active service in numerous engagements and several expedi- tions, including the Banks expedition to the Rio Grande at Brownsville, where he engaged in military service for one year. Returning to New Orleans he
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was sent up the Mississippi river to Morganza, La. For deeds of heroism in the battles of Newtown, Bull Bayou and Franklin he was promoted to be captain in November, 1863. Toward the close of the war he was sent by General Emery to Austin, Tex., with a number of military orders and dis- patches to the mayor of Austin and the governor of Texas, the burden of which was to yield to Union authority. In the face of incredible dangers, he accom- plished the trip alone, delivered the messages, hauled down the Confederate flag and hoisted the stars and stripes from the dome of the state capitol at Austin June 21, 1865, just as the troops of General Custer appeared on the hill east of the city. Having been honorably discharged at Morganza, La., November 26, 1864, he had taken up the recruiting of the Third Texas Cavalry in New Orleans and, but for the close of the war, would have been commis- sioned major of the new regiment.
During the course of the Banks expedition while Captain Reid of Com- pany B was serving as officer of the day and riding up the main street of Brownsville, Tex., he accidentally met his father, at the time a refugee; for having refused to enter the Confederate service he had to flee for his life, and was even then trying to find some means of getting to the Union lines. Mean- while the mother with her two daughters had protected the Texas home by means of firearms, but one thousand head of cattle had been stolen and other head of stock aggregating three thousand, besides which all the valuable tools and equipment for the stone and lime business had been stolen or destroyed, so the family faced the direst poverty. With customary energy, backed by youth and strength, Captain Reid set about the difficult task of making a livelihood from the ruined farm, and he succeeded even better than he could have hoped. Meanwhile John L. Haynes, the colonel of the First Texas Cavalry, had been appointed collector of the port of Texas, and he forthwith appointed Captain Reid inspector of the customs in 1869, a position the latter held for seven years. Meanwhile he acquired other interests. On one occasion he took a drove of three thousand head of cattle and one hundred and fifty head of horses to the foot of the Black Hills in Dakota. For three years the served as deputy United States marshal of the western district of Texas, after which he returned to Galveston and for sixteen years engaged in the cotton business. The great flood in that city entirely destroyed property worth $25,000, and thus forced him to face the world anew. On account of his only son developing asthmatic troubles he came to California in 1893, first settling in Los Angeles, but in 1905 he removed to Lake county and purchased forty acres in Big valley. This he sold in 1910 and during the same year bought ten acres in the same district, which he is now improving and on which he makes a home. Since coming to this county he has been one of the leaders in the G. A. R. Post at Upper Lake, and also has been a leader in devotion to the Republican party, whose principles he has never ceased to uphold. Devotion to the Union cost the family heavily, for they lost $35,000 worth of property during the Civil war and were never reimbursed for the amount of their losses or any part thereof, yet in spite of the heavy financial losses he has never regretted having given his time and strength and influence to the cause of the Union.
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