History of Orange County, California : with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the county who have been identified with its earliest growth and development from the early days to the present, Part 170

Author: Armor, Samuel, 1843-; Pleasants, J. E., Mrs
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: Los Angeles : Historic Record Co.
Number of Pages: 1700

USA > California > Orange County > History of Orange County, California : with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the county who have been identified with its earliest growth and development from the early days to the present > Part 170

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Juan P. Peralta now owns a ranch of eight acres, which he bought fourteen years ago. In November, 1918, he built a bungalow, which affords him and his family a very good and up-to-date home. In 1887 he was married to Miss Betsida Yorba, born at Prado, Riverside County, the daughter of Rimondo and Concepcion (Serrano) Yorba, who was also a granddaughter of Bernardo Yorba, and they had six children-Juan Pablo, Jr., Neavis, Ramon, Florisa, Ellena and Constance. For several years he had a general store at Peralta; now he grows walnuts and apricots. He also leases over 500 acres of land and engages in raising grain and hay, in which he is very successful.

A Democrat in matters of national political moment, Mr. Peralta is nonpartisan in his enthusiastic support of whatever makes for a greater development of his home district. He has served as a trustee of the Peralta school district, has been road overseer for some time, and has done jury duty at various times. Orange County is happy to note the prosperity of those who so well represent the historic past of the state.

Dr. Peralta

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WILLIAM LEMKE .- One of the very enterprising men among the prominent and successful citizens of Orange County who has contributed his share in the up- building and development of the citrus and walnut industries of the county is William Lemke, the owner of a twenty-acre ranch, devoted to oranges, walnuts and deciduous fruits, located three miles north of Olive, on the Santa Ana Canyon Boulevard.

Mr. Lemke was born at Liptno, in Russia Poland, October 16, 1870, the son of Charles and Wilhelmina (Zutke) Lemke, who were also natives of that country. The father came to the United States in 1886, to prepare a home for his family and was joined a year later by his wife. In the fall of 1889, William, accompanied by his brother August, crossed the ocean to make his home in the New World and to seek his fortune in the Golden State. He came with his brother to Placentia, Orange County, where he secured employment on a ranch. In 1892 he took up a homestead in Lassen County, on which he proved up and afterwards sold. He returned to Orange County where he purchased his present twenty-acre ranch, which at that time was uncultivated land used as a pasture. Mr. Lemke has always been a hard worker and through his industrious efforts and untiring energy has developed his desert land into a prosperous. up-to-date ranch which bespeaks success. Five acres are planted to Valencia oranges, six acres to deciduous fruits, eight acres are devoted to walnuts and one acre to the home site and yard. Mr. Lemke in 1920 built and completed a beautiful ten-room residence at a cost of about $10,000.

In 1906 Mr. Lemke was united in marriage with Miss Emma Schmidt, also a native of Russia Poland, who came to Anaheim in 1903. Her father, Adolph Schmidt, died in Russia and her mother, Christena (Biske) Schmidt, came to California in 1914, where she makes her home with her daughters. Mr. and Mrs. Lemke are the parents of three children: Lydia, Elsie and Adolph William F. In religious matters Mr. Lemke is a member of the German Lutheran Church at Olive, while his wife belongs to the German Baptist Church at Anaheim.

William Lemke is a patriotic American citizen, proud to be known as a self-made man who has gained financial success by his own unaided efforts and by his industry and the practice of economy.

GEORGE M. BARTLEY .- A well-informed, level-headed young man, who has a splendid ranch of Valencia orange trees in a high state of cultivation near one of the tasteful bungalow homes of the locality, and who, through his business specialty, is contributing toward the preservation of other ranch properties and, therefore, doing a commendable public service, is George M. Bartley, the deputy constable and sprayer, and popular son of a highly-esteemed pioneer. He was born at Lompoc, in Santa Barbara County, on October 21, 1880, the son of David J. Bartley, a native of New York State, who came to Salinas, Cal., in 1875, an agriculturist who had farmed in Nebraska. In that state, too, he had married Miss Mary Ann Hoyt, a lady always esteemed by all who knew her for her high ideals and capability as a wife, mother, friend and neighbor. Mr. Bartley died in El Modena in 1909, seventy-two years old; and Mrs. Bartley passed to her eternal reward after a distressing railway accident. In 1888 with Grandfather William Bartley and an aunt, Miss Rose Benton, Mrs. Bartley was driving along Fruit Street, Santa Ana, when their vehicle was struck by a Santa Fe locomotive, and the occupants were instantly killed. Seldom has there been wider regret at the demise of anyone than in the case of this estimable lady, whose broad sympathies enabled her to be of service to many, and whose integrity, like that of her devoted husband, was marked. They had three children: Will H., the rancher at Buena Park; Margaret E., now Mrs. Thomas, residing at Fresno; and George Milton, the subject of this sketch.

He was only one year old when he was brought to El Modena hy his parents, and he is therefore the citizen who has lived there longest continuously. He was brought up at El Modena on his father's ranch, and attended the local grammar school while he made himself useful on a forty-acre ranch. His father was a vineyardist, and in common with others suffered heavy losses when the mysterious blight killed the grapevines said to have been of the finest quality. George was always handy around horses, and being a good teamster, drove a tank wagon for the Union Oil Company in Los Angeles for five years.

Then he went to Corcoran, in Kern County, and there bought a farm and engaged in ranching from 1907 until 1909. In that year, he was married at Bakersfield to Miss Frankie S. Rudolph of Lompoc, the same town, by-the-way, in which Mr. Bartley was born; and after that he and his bride came back to El Modena, reaching home just before his father died.

Since 1909, Mr. Bartley has put in his time at El Modena, in 1916 becoming a licensed sprayer and branching off into the business of spraying trees. He bought a bean spraying outfit with a two-hundred gallon tank, and is doing his full share of 56

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the work in both the Villa Park and the El Modena districts. He belongs to the Orange Growers Association at McPherson, and is active in promoting in every way the interests of all the community, including the further appreciation of land. He is also a member of the El Modena Farm Center. Mr. Bartley's father paid sixty-five dollars an acre for his land, and our subject has refused $5,000 an acre.

A Republican in matters of national politics, Mr. Bartley served for three years as deputy sheriff under Sheriff C. E. Ruddock, and for four years as deputy constable under Logan Jackson; and he is at present deputy constable under William A. Holt, of Orange. He is also a member of the election board.

Mr. and Mrs. Bartley have had two children: Dorothy E. is in the grammar school at El Modena; but Glennagene died when fourteen months old. The family live in a comfortable bungalow recently built by Mr. Bartley himself at El Modena, opposite the El Modena grammar school. Mr. Bartley belongs to the Woodmen of the World.

JOSHUA BARKER .- An intelligent, industrious and ambitious worker, who is valued by all who know him as an honest, reliable citizen and a good fellow, is Joshua Barker, the rancher near Irvine Station, whose able and faithful wife is also just the helpmate needed. He works for Henry J. Harkleroad as foreman on his fine ranch of 160 acres to the southeast of Irvine, and no more competent overseer probably could be found.

A native son happy in his association with the Golden State, Mr. Barker was born at Tulare on April 20, 1862, the son of William Barker who was an early settler in that county. He was a native of Missouri, and was married to Miss Margaret Burris, who hailed from that same state, and there he became a successful farmer and stock- raiser. William Barker has passed away; but his esteemed widow is still living at Tustin. They had ten children, eight of whom are still living; and among them Joshua is the oldest.

His schooling was very limited, for from boyhood he had to do plenty of hard work at farming. He began hiring out for low wages when a lad, and continued to work by the month until he was thirty-five, when he succeeded in renting land in Ven- tura County. He planted blackeye beans, and enjoyed, as never before, the harvest, for what he reaped was entirely his own. Later, he came down to the San Joaquin ranch in Orange County; and since then he has moved back and forth between here and Ventura County, sought by many both for his services and his experience and advice, and contributing something definite, in his own hard work for the higher cultivation of land, toward the development of California agriculture.

At Santa Ana, Mr. Barker was married to Miss Martha Horton, a native of Ven- tura and they have had six children: Walter, who married Miss Maude Boyd of Santa Ana, is foreman on a ranch at San Luis Rey; Roy, the husband of Miss Lottie Steward of Ventura, is farming near Orange County Park, the proud father of two children, Hazel and Donald; Alice married Charles Van Horn, a truck driver on road work for Orange County, she has one boy, Glenn, and resides at Santa Ana; Freddie is em- ployed at ranching at Talbert, and is the husband of Miss Maude Albertson of that town, by whom he has had two children, Lloyd and Llodine; Elsie is the wife of Victor Vann, a ranch employe at. El Centro; and Jim is in the U. S. Navy. It will thus be seen that not only have Mr. and Mrs. Barker done well themselves, but they have reared a family, each member of which has gone forth into the world and become a credit to the good Barker name.

JOHN H. STINSON .- The well-known rancher, citrus grower and dairy farmer, John H. Stinson of Taft Avenue, Orange, Cal., has attained a gratifying degree of success in the vocation he has chosen. He is a native of Hall County, Nebr., where he was born at Doniphan, January 3, 1880, and is the son of Edward and Dinah (Harrod) Stinson. His father was born thirty miles from Dublin, Ireland, came to the Province of Quebec, Canada, with his parents when a babe, and was reared there. His mother is a native of London, England, and accompanied her parents to America from her native city, settling at Rockford, Ill., where later her marriage occurred. After their marriage the parents lived in various places and finally settled in Hall County, Nebr., going thither from Illinois. The father traded his team of horses for a relinquishment and proved up on a 160-acre homestead, where his son John H. was born and reared until he attained the age of eleven. He worked on his father's farm, held the breaking plow and turned virgin soil of Nebraska when only nine years old. The family migrated to Orange County, Cal., and settled at Villa Park, then called Wanda Station, on the Southern Pacific, where the father had already traded Nebraska land for a forty-acre ranch on Vista Street, Orange; here he followed farming until his death, April 1], 1911, being survived by his widow.

Clyde R. alling.

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John H. is the eleventh child in a family of fourteen children, six of whom are living, He received his education in the grammar school at Orange, and worked on his father's forty-acre ranch. At the age of nineteen he assumed the responsibilities of life and purchased fifteen acres on Vista Street, Orange, for $1,200. He was married in Orange, July 26, 1905, to Miss Ethel Durler, daughter of Reverend Levi and Alice (Lyon) Durler, who now live at Orange. Mrs. Stinson was horn at Stryker, Ohio, and was reared in Ohio, Indiana and Michigan, coming to California with her parents in 1904. She is the oldest of four living children. Mr. and Mrs. Stinson are the parents of a danghter, Jennie Fay by name, and have an adopted son whose name is Ernest. Mr. Stinson owns a ranch of seventeen acres on Taft Avenue, which he planted to Valencia oranges, now in bearing, and is also a joint owner with his brother, E. G. Stinson, in a seventy-eight-acre dairy ranch on the Santa Ana River on Taft Avenne. This was a barren waste of brush and trees, which they cleared, leveled the land and planted to alfalfa. Although they have service for irrigation from the S. A. V. I. Com- pany, they have installed an electric pumping plant of 125 inches. They have a well selected dairy herd of 129 cows. Their buildings are modern and sanitary and equipped with milking machines.

Mr. Stinson is a type of citizen of whom Orange County may well be prond and has been most helpful to the permanent welfare of that section. He is active, intelli- gent and interesting, with a strong appreciation of humor, which is perhaps a heritage from his Hibernian ancestry. Mrs. Stinson is a woman of pleasing personality, cnl- tured and refined, with most excellent qualities of heart and mind. She is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Orange and is active in church work, the Ladies' Aid Society and the Home Mission Society, and both are popular among their large circle of acquaintances.

CLYDE R. ALLING .- The interesting career of a hustling young business man of Santa Ana affords another illustration of not only the unrivalled opportunities pre- sented for advancement and success in California, and especially in Orange County, but the elastic capability of the typical American in rising to the occasion when Oppor- tunity opens the door. This wide-awake young man is Clyde R. Alling, proprietor of the "Cherry Blossom" bakery, confectionery store and cafe in Santa Ana, which is pleasantly and conveniently situated at 120 East Fourth Street.

He was born in the city of Chicago on August 28, 1892, and in that city passed his early life. He attended the grammar schools, and commenced his mercantile oper- ations against heavy odds by working as a newsboy and selling the Chicago Tribune and Inter-Ocean on the crowded streets. This strenuons exertion was rendered neces- sary because of political intrignes which had half-ruined his father, a contractor. The lad developed something of the system that hie displays today, knowing just where and when to sell, and catching the big idea of giving people what they want, and when. After a while, however, he saw that selling newspapers could not be the avocation he must eventually be looking for, and he changed jobs, to run a soda fountain at Peoria, Il1.

In 1912, heeding Horace Greeley's advice, "Go West, and grow up with the country," Mr. Alling came to Santa Ana, Cal., and for a year he worked at the soda fountain in the Dragon store. Two years later, in Jannary, he made sacrifices to buy L. J. Christopher's confectionery store in Anaheim, now the "Cherry Blossom" and the success of that popular resort today shows whether or not his judgment was good.

Sighing for more worlds to conquer-as a local scribe once said of him in an appreciative write-up-Mr. Alling, on November 25, 1915, returned to Santa Ana and leased the building formerly occupied by the California National Bank, preparatory to opening another Cherry Blossom. Then came the flood, and for four months Mr. Alling paid rent on a building he could not occupy. Worse than that, no one seemed to care a fig, whether he came or not; but in March, 1916, he threw open for business what he considered to be the finest-equipped confectionery in Santa Ana. He spent $30,000 in fitting up and finishing this most attractive place in Orange County, occupying as it does the entire building, with the basement; and when the people began to find their way to the "Cherry Blossom," they also began to comprehend what had been added to the worth-while attractions of Santa Ana.

The basement is used for chocolate dipping and a stock room, and on the first floor there is the soda fountain, the restaurant and the ice cream parlor. The second floor is devoted to the manufacture of candies and other confections, for Mr. Alling manufactures almost everything that he sells. There is an ice house in the rear, where the choicest of ice cream is made, not only for patrons in town, but for such near-by resorts as Laguna Beach, Newport and Balboa, and also for Orange and other towns. Boasting the finest dining room in the city, it is not surprising that the cash register should show an annual patronage of a couple of hundred thousand satisfied customers.

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A likeable man, an honorable competitor and, most of all, an untiring worker, Clyde Alling long ago rose to the point where he was a great factor in the develop- ment of wholesale and retail trade in Orange County. With only twenty-eight years behind him, it is also not surprising that he should feel a great future ahead. Of genial disposition, with always a word of cheer, no matter what the weather happens to be, he draws customers as a honey-pot draws flies. His handshake is one you feel. His words are words you remember. And most of all he is busy, for long hours are re- quired to run "Cherry Blossoms," and he is always on the job. This strenuosity, how- ever, in business hours does not prevent him from snatching a few moments, now and then, to enjoy the company of his fellow Masons and Elks.

JOHN GREEN BAKER .- A successful farmer and bean grower who had the advantage of a wide and valuable experience in other pursuits and elsewhere before he came to the Irvine ranch, is John Green Baker, who lives one mile and a half northeast of Irvine. He was born in Madison County, Tenn., on August 9, 1874, amid the stimulating environment of the Cumberland Mountains, and until he was fifteen lived in that state. Then, with his folks, he moved to La Veta, Colo., and for a year had the hard work of a farmer's lad. After that, he went to Texas, then to New Mexico, and later still to Arizona; and in 1912 he arrived in the Golden State. He thus went to school in three states-Tennessee, Colorado and Texas. His father was the Rev. W. H. Baker of the Baptist Church, in whose ministry for years he did faithful, self-sacrificing service, and he is now living in Arkansas, retired, at the age of eighty. His mother was Miss Nancy Green before her marriage, and she was born in North Carolina and died in Texas. She had eight children, of whom John is the seventh in the order of birth of the family.

John G. Baker started out for himself in Texas as an employe on a Donley County cattle ranch, then teamed and rode range in New Mexico and mined at Bisbee, Ariz .; and on coming to California he followed the carpenter trade in Los Angeles until 1915, when he came to Santa Ana and engaged in ranching. He now operates 160 acres on the Irvine ranch, which he has planted to lima beans, and he is among those who get satisfactory results whenever the conditions of climate make it possible to succeed.

When Mr. Baker was married in Los Angeles in 1912, he took for his wife Mrs. Inez Asbell, nee White, a native of Ohio; and together they have worked hard to solve the problems peculiar to California agriculture, and they are gradually attaining more and more of an enviable position. A consistent Democrat, but a broad-minded American, always desirous of pulling with his neighbors for whatever is best for the locality irrespective of party considerations, Mr. Baker has been serving as a popular member of the election board in the San Joaquin voting precinct.

CHARLES E. BEST .- An experienced rancher who has entrusted to his judgment and fidelity an important interest of the Irvine Ranch is Charles E. Best, in charge of the hog ranch on the old San Joaquin. He was born in San Benito, on November 12, 1871, the son of Newton Wells Best, a native of Port Williams, N. S., where he was born on October 12, 1838, and his good wife, also a Nova Scotian, who was Annie C. Holmes before her marriage, in Nova Scotia in 1864. There their two eldest children were born. Newton Wells Best left his family on March 19, 1868, and landed at San Francisco on April 19 of the same year, having lost five days in New York City waiting for a steamer. Settling first on the San Benito River, then in Monterey, now in San Benito County, he took up Government land and farmed for five years, and then he came south to Santa Maria Valley, in Santa Barbara County, where he stayed another five years, also farming. His next move was to Santa Ana, then in Los Angeles County, which he reached in 1878, and there he bought a farm in the New Hope school district, and helped to build the New Hope schoolhouse, acting as one of the school trustees.

He farmed at New Hope for seven years, and then he went to what is now Beaumont in Riverside County, then San Gorgonio, San Bernardino County, where he operated on a still larger scale in farming for fifteen years. When he quit farming, he moved to Redlands and lived there for fourteen years, running a grocery, and a feed and fuel business. He returned to Santa Ana in 1914; and there, three years later, his devoted wife died, aged seventy-one years.

Nine children were born to this worthy couple: William Henry is of the real estate firm, Best, DeBoyce and Covington in Brawley, Cal .; Frank S. is retired and lives in Pasadena; Fred N. is a carpenter and builder at Lamona, in Iowa; Charles Everett is the subject of our review; Arthur L. died when he was fourteen years old; Maude is the wife of G. M. Austin, an Imperial Valley rancher; Pearla is now Mrs. W. A. Hively and resides at Turlock, Stanislaus County; Luella has become Mrs. H. H. Moore and resides at Colton; Joseph died when he was two years old.

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Charles was sent to the grammar school, and grew up with the usual limited, yet positive advantages of a boy in the country. On September 20. 1898, he was married to Miss Jessie Speed of Santa Ana, who was born in Potsdam, N. Y., and came to Orange County in 1892 with her parents, John and Marthesia (Stanton) Speed. After their marriage they continued farming at Beaumont for eight years, then moved to Redlands where he lived six years, thence to San Jacinto where he ranched for five years. In the fall of 1915 they located in Orange County and began ranching on the Irvine ranch and in the management of the hog ranch, Mr. Best has made numerous contributions to practical ranching by modern, improved methods.

Five children have gladdened the hospitable, comfortable home of Mr. and Mrs. Best. Jessie Pearla is a senior in the Santa Ana high school. Everett and Elliott are twins, and are universal favorites through their playing right and left halfback on the football team of the Santa Ana high school. And there are Stanton and Ralph Le Roy. full of promise.

E. S. MORALES .- A self-educated ranchman, proud of his descent from one of the old, distinguished families of Spanish history and tradition, who has come to the front by sheer force of his own ability and worth, is E. S. Morales, popularly known as Captain Morales, residing on the Hot Springs road some five miles northeast of San Juan Capistrano. He is a tenant farmer on a part of the great Santa Margarita rancho, the oldest grant at San Juan Capistrano. He was born at Los Angeles on October 18, 1866, but was reared at San Juan Capistrano. He had the usual schooling for a boy in that locality, and early went to work for Richard O'Neill, the father of Jerome O'Neill. the present owner of the Santa Margarita ranch, on which farm he has been steadily since 1886. He is a vaquero, and one of the fine old type, and as such can rope and brand a steer, break a broncho, shoe a horse, skin a beef, or even run a binder and repair any kind of machinery, such as is used about a farnı.

When Captain Morales decided to share his domestic life with another, he married Miss Morina Garcia, a popular belle of San Juan Capistrano, and also a member of one of the early Spanish families. She has proved an excellent helpmate, making him a good home, while he attends to his many responsibilities. All in all. he is a very unusual man, and it is not surprising that he is honored with the title of captain. For years, he has been one of the most trusted of the many employes on the great Santa Margarita ranch, in which principality he is employed at various tasks. He can drive two, four, eight, sixteen, thirty-two or even sixty-four horses, and he is both a blacksmith and a machinist of no mean ability. His generous and whole-hearted dis- position has earned for him the good will of all those associated with, or under him.

During the present season, he is engaged in harvesting a "bumper" crop of the celebrated "Defiance" wheat on his leasehold of 190 acres; and it will run forty bushels to the acre, worth five dollars per hundred weight-one of the best crops, very likely. in Orange County. He has a twenty-inch cylinder Case thresher, and other thoroughly up-to-date appliances, and is often able to point the way to others in modern agri- cultural methods.

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History of Orange County, California : with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the county who have been identified with its earliest growth and development from the early days to the present, Part 170

Author: Armor, Samuel, 1843-; Pleasants, J. E., Mrs Publication date: 1921 Publisher: Los Angeles : Historic Record Co. Number of Pages: 1700

Author: Armor, Samuel, 1843-; Pleasants, J. E., Mrs
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: Los Angeles : Historic Record Co.
Number of Pages: 1700