USA > California > San Bernardino County > History of San Bernardino and Riverside counties, Volume II > Part 31
USA > California > Riverside County > History of San Bernardino and Riverside counties, Volume II > Part 31
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JAMES AND ALEXANDER STEWART constitute a firm of notably success- ful orange growers in the Highgrove district of Riverside County. The older of the brothers, James Stewart, has been an orange grower in Southern California for a third of a century. He was joined by his younger brother nine years later, and their operations at Highgrove have shown them to be men of most thorough efficiency in this branch of horticulture. They have proved equally good citizens, and both are bachelors.
Their parents were Alexander and Maggie (Stewart) Stewart. The father, now deceased, was born in Scotland, while the mother is a native of Ontario and of Scotch descent, and is still living at the old home in Canada.
James Stewart was born in Ontario June 30, 1865, and acquired a public school education there. He was twenty-two when he came to California in 1887, and first located near San Bernardino. There he bought ten acres of oranges and cultivated this tract for ten years. After selling he bought six acres at Highgrove, and has been tending that property ever since. The year after his purchase at Highgrove he was joined by his brother Alexander, and together they purchased ten acres of oranges on Center Street at Highgrove, and have handled this in partnership.
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James Stewart is a member of the Chamber of Commerce in Highgrove and a director in the Highgrove Fruit Exchange, is interested in the Painted Hills Oil Association at Whitewater in Riverside County, and also in the Chino-Corona Oil Company. He is a member of the Inde- pendent Order of Odd Fellows and the Independent Order of Foresters at Riverside.
Alexander Stewart was born in Ontario January 17, 1868. He also attended the public schools during his youth and saw much of the practical side of farming in Ontario until 1896, when he came out to Riverside. He learned the horticultural business by working experience in orange groves, and for some time was also a railroad employe. After a time he began to take care of orange groves, and to some extent still follows that business. After he joined his brother in the purchase of the ten acres on Center Street he devoted nearly all his time to its cultivation, and has been responsible for bringing this tract into a high state of production.
Alexander Stewart is affiliated with the Odd Fellows and Foresters. He is a leaseholder in the Painted Hills Oil Association at Whitewater, a property that is now highly promising as a source of petroleum.
CHARLES B. CLARK-The first settlers in Riverside were loud in their praise of the scenic attractiveness, though they recognized that a great work had to be done in order to supplement the beauty and grandeur of the landscape before the country would be available for homes and the sustaining of a large population. This work has in a large and im- portant measure been carried out since then. Every house built and every acre brought under cultivation has been a factor in the progress and de- velopment of this garden spot of Southern California. One of the men of the later class of pioneers who performed a notable service in this material development was Charles B. Clark, who labored here with purposeful energy and success for nearly twenty years.
Charles B. Clark was born in Illinois, April 8, 1847, son of John C. and Mary (Meacham) Clark. Through the Meacham family he is a direct descendant of Miles Standish and the earliest settlements in New England. Charles B. Clark had a good education in the public schools of Illinois, and for about twenty years his energies were completely bestowed upon his vocation as an Illinois farmer.
Mr. Clark arrived at Riverside December 19, 1891. He soon after- ward bought fifteen acres of land in the arroyo and side hills on Victoria Avenue, lying north and west of Victoria Hill. To the time of his death, which occurred nearly twenty years later, March 9, 1911, he with his sons gave their studious attention to the improvement and cultivation of this tract. It had been partly planted to vineyard. His line of development was in oranges and deciduous fruits, and long before his death he saw the profits of his labors. He built a comfortable home at 2193 Victoria Avenue. He had Woodbine Street cut through his property to a connec- tion with Victoria Avenue. That section was practically uninhabited when he came to Riverside. Before his death it was well built up and developed, and is regarded as one of the most attractive sections in the city. In all his work Mr. Clark was aided by his sons, and Mrs. Clark continued the active supervision of the property until 1920, when she turned over the management to her son Frank.
The late Charles B. Clark was a man of high standing in the com- munity and respected by all who knew him. He was a republican, but not active in politics.
Mr. Clark married Miss Hannah J. Pew, of Minnesota, but a native of Indiana and daughter of James F. Pew. Mrs. Clark is a mother of
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seven children : John Standish Clark, a New York business man, during the World war furnished an ambulance to the forces in France, married Josephine Preterre, a native of France, who came to this country when an infant. The second child, Florence Dewitt Clark, is deceased. Jessie Burrett, is the wife of Harry Meenahan, of Riverside, and is the mother of three daughters, Alice, Violet and Lucile. The fourth child, Charles Freeland Clark, is also deceased. The son Frank, who manages his father's old orange grove on Victoria Avenue, married Miss Annie Knight, of Riverside, and has a daughter, Elizabeth Jane. Marion Louise is the wife of Frank A. Miller, owner of the Glenwood Mission Inn. Benjamin Clark, the youngest of the family, was trained as a soldier in the 89th Division under General Woods and spent a year overseas, being discharged as a sergeant. He is now a trainer of polo ponies at Kansas City, Missouri.
Mrs. Clark is a member of the First Congregational Church. In 1920 her son-in-law, Frank A Miller, sent her on a visit to the eastern states. When she returned she was ushered into a palatial new concrete house on her land at 2191 Victoria Avenue. This house Mr. Miller, as a characteristic act of his generosity, had caused to be constructed during her absence and presented it to her as a token of his affection and esteem.
GEORGE J. OBERSCHMIDT put his energy and ability into effective play in the development of one of the fine fruit orchards of the Riverside district, gained a high place in popular confidence and esteem in the state and county of his adoption, and was one of the representative citizens and fruit-growers of Riverside County at the time of his death, in 1907. His fine personality was the expression of a noble and loyal nature, and his stewardship extended beyond mere individual advancement to express itself effectively in connection with community affairs.
Mr. Oberschmidt was born in Washtenaw County, Michigan, in the vear 1865, and thus was forty-two years of age at the time of his death. His parents, Christian and Agnes (Bohnett) Oberschmidt, continued their residence in Michigan until their deaths, and were sterling pioneers of that state. George J. Oberschmidt was reared to the sturdy discipline of the home farm and acquired his early education in the public schools of his native state. There he continued his active association with agricultural industry until the early '90s, when he came to Riverside County, California, and purchased a ten-acre orange grove in the Highgrove district and ten acres of land in the Perris Valley, near the old Indian School. He brought the orchard up to the best standard and continued to give it his personal supervision until the close of his life. He was one of the organizers of the Highgrove Fruit Exchange, and continued as a director of the same until his death. At the inception of the Spanish-American war Mr. Oberschmidt promptly manifested his patriotism by enlisting in Company K of a regiment of infantry at San Bernardino, and with his command he proceeded to San Francisco, where the regiment remained during its period of service, without having been called to the stage of active conflict. Mr. Oberschmidt was a member of the Spanish-American War Veterans and was affiliated with the Independent Order of Foresters.
At Highgrove, on the 22nd of August, 1900, was recorded the marriage of Mr. Oberschmidt with Miss Iva Morena Mumper, who was born in the State of Illinois and who is a daughter of Jacob H. Mumper. Mr. Mumper was a scion of an old Pennsylvania family of German lineage and became a prosperous farmer in Illinois, besides which he was a skilled
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cabinetmaker. As a young man he was a successful teacher in the public schools, and lasting honor attaches to his name by reason of the gallant service which he gave as a soldier in the Civil war, he having been a member of the Fifth Illinois Cavalry and having participated in many important battles, besides having been with the forces of General Sherman on the historic march from Atlanta to the sea. In later years Mr. Mumper vitalized his interest in his old comrades by means of appreciative affilia- tion with the Grand Army of the Republic. His wife, whose maiden name was Hester Ann Bennett, was born at Newcastle, Indiana, her father, John Bennett, having been a valiant soldier of the Union in the Civil war, and representatives of the Bennett family, which is of English ancestry, were patriotic American soldiers in the War of the Revolution. The mother of Mrs. Mumper was a Carroll, a lineal descendant of Charles Carroll of Carrollton of Colonial times. Mr. and Mrs. Ober- schmidt became the parents of two children, who remain with their widowed mother in the attractive home at Highgrove. Eleanor Aileen was graduated from the Riverside High School as a member of the class of 1919, and now holds the position of stenographer and bookkeeper in the office of the Motor Supply Company of Riverside. Ernest Jefferson Oberschmidt is a member of the class of 1923 in the Riverside High School, and his purpose is to prepare himself for the legal profession. He is at this writing a corporal in the military branch of the school. He is a valued assistant to his mother in the care and management of the productive operations of the home property. Mrs. Oberschmidt is a zealous member of the Methodist Episcopal Church of Highgrove, is affiliated with the Woman's Relief Corps at Riverside and the Ladies of the Maccabees, is treasurer of the Home Farm Department at Highgrove, and is a popular figure in the social life of the home community. Since the death of her husband she has largely increased her property holdings, which includes a ten acre peach and walnut grove, which she acquired by purchase and which she has planted and brought into a high state of cultivation
ROBERT J. LUTZ-Riverside as a beautiful home city has attracted Robert J. Lutz to its citizenship twice, and as a man of means, public spirit and original ideas he has contributed to the further advantages of the community in a most substantial measure.
Mr. Lutz is widely and favorably known in business and civic circles of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he was born November 28, 1864, son of Frank J. and Eva ( Neblett ) Lutz. His parents are now deceased. His mother was born in Butler County, Pennsylvania, of German an- cestry. His father was a native of Munich, Germany, came to the United States when five or six years of age, joined a Pittsburgh com- pany for service in the Union Army during the Civil war, and after- ward remained in Pittsburgh and was prominent in the hotel business there until his death in 1902. He also served as a school director and was otherwise prominent in local affairs.
Robert J. Lutz attended public schools in Pittsburgh, finishing his high school course in 1884. For a time he was a foreman of bridge building, but soon took up the vocation of his father. He had the proper courage required for commercial success, an evidence of which fact is that he borrowed twenty thousand dollars to go into the hotel business, assuring his wife that he intended to retire in ten years. In fact, he retired after nine years, had paid off his indebtedness in fourteen months and doubled his business. The Lutz Hotel, of which he was then proprietor, was one of the old landmarks in Pittsburgh, but changed its name when Mr. Lutz sold it.
Robert & Lut
Sarah July
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As a hotel man he heard repeated stories of the Golden West, and as soon as his business affairs could be arranged he lost no time in visit- ing here and investigating for himself. While still retaining the owner- ship of the hotel building and grounds he came to California in 1905 and traveled over the state from one end to the other, seeing and consider- ing all the advantages of the best towns. The search ended when he and Mrs. Lutz reached Riverside. He bought the land on the southeast corner of Pepper and Seventh streets, believing it would be part of the finest residence district, though at the time no building had been done in this immediate section. He built the house now occupied by A. E. White and lived there until 1912, when business obliged him to return to Pittsburgh. He sold his residence and in the fall after his return to Pittsburgh erected a new hotel under the name of the Lutz House, a property he still owns. He was its manager for about fifteen months, and states that there was hardly a minute in the day when he was not thinking of and longing for California. After leasing the management of his hotel he returned with the idea of making Hollywood or Pasadena his home. Another investigation following, but with no discoveries suf- ficient to wean their hearts from Riverside. This time Mr. Lutz bought the northeast corner of Seventh and Pepper streets, and constructed there one of the handsomest architectural adornments of the city. It is typ- ically Californian but also embodies features from the Mission, Italian and Gothic styles blended into a harmonious whole. The same treatment was made of his garage and grounds, and one of the features is an outside lighting system that it is his custom to keep in full blaze through- out Easter Eve until dawn and combines with the beautiful view afforded the crowds that gather on the top of Rubidoux awaiting the famous Easter services. Mr. Lutz was also instrumental in securing the street lighting system in that district, a plan soon followed by the remainder of the city. Besides his home he is owner of business property on Eighth Street between Orange and Main streets.
During his residence in Riverside Mr. Lutz has taken a deep interest in all civic affairs. He was active in the Liberty Bond drives during the war, and has worked with different charitable organizations. He is a leading member of the Home League, also of the Knights of Columbus, whose great increase in membership in recent years he has eagerly pro- moted and is at present advocate for the Knights of Columbus Lodge. He has also been an effective worker in increasing the membership and influence of the local Elks' Club. He is a member of the St. Francis de Sales Catholic Church and was a liberal contributor to the building of the present church edifice. While in Pittsburgh Mr. Lutz had an active part in politics, serving on the Republican City and County Cen- tral Committees, representing the party at County and State Conven- tions, and was at one time a member of the City Council and Board of Education.
At Steubenville, Ohio, November 6, 1894, Mr. Lutz married Miss Sarah McBride, who was born in Glasgow, Scotland, and came to the United States when a girl. Her father was the late Mease McBride, a Pittsburgh contractor.
JOHN L. GWINNUP has played a prominent part in the development of Riverside County as a center of the orange-growing industry, and is con- sistently to be termed a pioneer in the poultry industry in this favored section of the state. He has achieved marked success as a commercial breeder of poultry. When he came to Riverside in 1892 the present beautiful city was little more than a village, and here he engaged in orchard and team work. He has the distinction of hauling the first
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orange shook-grader and equipment into Corona, this county, the half- carload of oranges thus graded having been packed by S. M. Butler in the freight depot of the Santa Fe Railroad. Thereafter Mr. Gwinnup hauled the grader to the Butler ranch on Brocton Avenue. Mr. Gwinnup came to Riverside early enough to assist in picking the first crop of oranges from the new groves, the yield having been twenty to forty boxes an acre. In the early days he hauled coal from the Elsinore Mine in Riverside County to Riverside, the round trip requiring two days and the coal having cost five dollars a ton. He has kept pace with progressive move- ments that have marked the splendid civic and material development of Riverside city and county, and is a sterling citizen who well merits recog- nition in this publication.
Mr. Gwinnup was born in Rush County, Indiana, February 14, 1867, and in that state were born also his parents, Job and Elizabeth (Smith) Gwinnup. The Gwinnup family was founded in America in the Colonial days, and its original representatives in this country came from Wales. The father of Job Gwinnup was born in New Jersey and became a pioneer settler in Indiana. He bought Government land for $1.25 an acre, and this land is now owned by John L. Gwinnup's brother Sylvester. The mother of the subject of this review was of Scotch lineage and a representative of a family that gave patriot soldiers to the Continental Line in the War of the Revolution.
John L. Gwinnup was reared on the old home farm and gained his early education in the public schools of the old Hoosier State. He was actively identified with farm work in Indiana from his boyhood until he was twenty-six years of age, and he was about eight years old at the time of the death of his father, with the result that he was early called upon to do a man's work on the home farm. For four summers he applied himself vigorously in caring for the farm of his widowed mother, and in the meanwile his activities seem to have been closely watched by a neighbor, who owned one hunderd and sixty acres of land adjoining the Gwinnup farm and whose somewhat distrustful and irascible nature was shown in his refusal to rent his land. Thus young Gwinnup had reason to be somewhat astonished when this neighbor approached him and offered to rent the land to him. The ambitious youth accepted the proposals and for a term of years thereafter, while still in his teens, he successfully carried on agriculture on this land.
In 1892, at the age of twenty-five years, Mr. Gwinnup came to Riverside County, California, and found employment at orchard and teaming work. He cared for the orchards of many of the pioneer orange- growers of the Riverside district, including Samuel Ames, Aldrich, Chap- man & Rogers, H. P. Snow, H. A. Puls and many others. He thus continued his service five years, and then turned his attention to inde- pendent grain and hay farming on Colton Avenue. After having been thus engaged about five years he purchased his present homestead place of six and one-half acres on Santa Ana Avenue, between Colton Avenue and North Orange Street, and here he devoted his attention principally to the raising of strawberries for seven years. This enterprise proved very profitable, and he received a representative demand for his product and at one period his production was so great that he was able to fix the market price. From 1901 until November 1, 1919, Mr. Gwinnup was carrier on one of the rural mail routes from Riverside, and while thus engaged he started in the poultry business; in the development of which he applied himself actively after having finished his day's work in the mail service. He has been in the commercial poultry business for the past seven years, and is running 2,800 hens and pullets on his poultry
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farın at the time of this writing, in 1921. He is the owner of six and three-tenths acres on North Main Street, and there he raises peaches. He is a charter member of the Southern California Poultry Association, is a member of the Farm Bureau, the California Mutual Benefit Life Insurance Association and the Woodmen of the World, and his political support is given to the democratic party. His family hold membership in the Seventh Day Adventist Church.
In November, 1898, Mr. Gwinnup married Miss Frances Brewer, a native of Missouri, and she is survived by one child, Anita May, who is now the wife of Clarence D. Carr, a farmer in the Cul du Sac district of Idaho. Mr. and Mrs. Carr have two children, John Edward and Dorothy.
July 5, 1906, recorded the marriage of Mr. Gwinnup with Mrs. Annie E. Holmes, who was born in Iowa, a daughter of John Vollmar. Mrs Gwinnup has one child by her first marriage, a daughter. Juanita Ruth, who is the wife of Dale B. Withers of Kentucky, a mechanic engaged with the Parker Machine Company of Riverside. Mr. and Mrs. Gwinnup have three children, Mildred, Clara E. and Esther.
JOSEPH F. HOOK-The force of initiative and enterprise and the in- tegrity that are essential to all business undertakings have been supplied in the Perris Valley of Riverside County and over extensive portions of the Imperial Valley in a notable measure by the firm of Hook Brothers, who have been extensive operators there for over thirty years, merchants, land owners, developers of land and business and men to whose dealings attaches the most scrupulous reputation for fairness and honor.
Of this firm, Joseph F. Hook was born in Maine September 15, 1850, son of Joseph and Mary Jane (Corson ) Hook, natives of Maine and of Revolutionary stock and English descent. The mother died in 1857. Joseph Hook, Sr., was a millwright by occupation. He went across the Isthmus of Panama to California in 1850. Later he returned East, but in 1861 permanently identified himself with the Pacific Coast. When he reached San Francisco, it is reported, he addressed the crowd around him saying : "The Lord forgive me going away from California. for I will never do so again." His family joined him in 1868. He continued to be prominently identified with the early life of California and Nevada until his death in 1881, and among other business relations was engineer of con- struction of the famous Virginia City, Nevada, mills.
Joseph F. Hook acquired a public school education in Maine and also the liberal advantages of the Skowhegan Academy and the Wesleyan Seminary. For two years he worked in a store at Portland, Maine, and he and his brother Albert were in Portland during the big fire of July 4. 1866. In 1876 they engaged in business as partners at San Francisco, conducting the Sixth Street Bazaar under the name of Hook Brothers for eleven years.
About 1887 the Hook Brothers transferred the scene of their operations to Perris. Riverside County. A detailed story of their business history would reflect nearly every important phase of development in this section. At Perris they erected a large store building and warehouse, conducting a general merchandise store, dealt in implements and seed. operated a barley mill and lumber yards in connection, and for years supplied no 4 of the fodder used in the mining operations of that district. These active commercial interests they sold in 1919, and since then Joseph Hook has been looking after his property and personal interests. Mr. Ilook devoted much capital and his personal enterprise to the development of the Imperial Valley. At one time he had an interest in eight hundred
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acres under water there, six hundred forty acres of it being a vast alfalfa field. Nearly all of this land has since been sold, though the brothers still have interests there.
Joseph Hook is a Royal Arch Mason, is a past master of Perris Lodge, F. and A. M., a member of the Perris Chamber of Commerce, and as a republican has represented his party in Riverside County Conventions. During the Civil war, though a boy, he drilled with a local company in Maine so as to be ready and fit should the call for active duty come.
In Lake County, California, December 1, 1880, Mr. Hook married Miss Emma L. Burtnett, of a French Huguenot family. She was a native of Illinois, where her father, Peter Burtnett, was a mill owner. Mr. and Mrs. Hook have six children: Joseph S., an economic geologist and expert in oils, who during the war had charge of the refining of the oil for the aviation field at Dayton, Ohio, and is now geologist for the Sinclair Oil Company of New York ; Chestina A., wife of J. F. Seymour, an attorney at El Centro, California ; Miss Edith L., an osteopath physician at El Centro ; Esther E., wife of H. E. Lane, of Van Nuys and the mother of three children; Carroll A., wife of Leslie H. Brigham, a farmer of Lakeside, California, and the mother of one child; and Miss Gladys J., wife of George Woodburn, of San Luis Obispo, California.
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