USA > California > San Bernardino County > History of San Bernardino and Riverside counties, Volume II > Part 61
USA > California > Riverside County > History of San Bernardino and Riverside counties, Volume II > Part 61
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October 12, 1881, Mr. McMahill married Miss Edith J. Taylor, daughter of William L. and Julia (Griffing) Taylor, of Windom, Minnesota. She was born at Plainview, Minnesota, August 12, 1858, and acquired her education in the public and normal schools of Man- kato. Mr. and Mrs. McMahill have three children: Florence, wife of A. Rife, of Blythe, Riverside County, California; Julia A., wife of G. R. Pryor, of Blythe ; and Lettie A., wife of James Kettering, also of Blythe. Mr. and Mrs. McMahill also have four grandchildren, Muriel Ardes Rife, Carroll Joy and Willis Pryor, and Gray Kettering.
SAMUEL A. STEWART is a veteran banker and business man of Elsinore, and has been one of the influential men in that section of Riverside County for thirty-five years.
Mr. Stewart was born in Richmond, Wisconsin, November 5, 1842, son of Samuel Stewart. He acquired a public school education at Rich- mond and attended Allen Grove Academy. As a very young man he enlisted in Company D of the 147th Illinois Infantry, served as a corporal, and received his honorable discharge on account of wounds. After the war he became a Wisconsin farmer and laid the foundation of his pros- perity in that section of the Middle West.
Mr. Stewart in 1887 came to California and located- at Elsinore, where he invested extensively in lands and developed them and prosecuted his farming interests actively for a number of years. He had a large grain ranch in Perris Valley and also owned the Alalpha ranch. He still owns two grain warehouses, and for several years was active in the grain business. He is best known in a business way, however, as a banker. and for twenty-seven years was president of the First National Bank of Elsinore.
Mr. Stewart was a member of the first Board of County Supervisors of Riverside County, and has served on the Elsinore City Council. He is a republican, was for many years a trustee of the Presbyterian Church, is affiliated with the Knights of Pythias and is a member of Riverside Post of the Grand Army of the Republic. He also belongs to the Elsinore Chamber of Commerce.
February 27, 1868, Mr. Stewart married Miss Ella E. Langley, of Richmond, Wisconsin. She was born in Dundee, Illinois, and was edu- cated in the public schools there and at Richmond, Wisconsin, and also attended the Allen Grove Academy. The two children born to Mr. and Mrs. Stewart were Corliss and Fred L., both now deceased. They have one grandchild, Samuel Stewart, son of Fred L. Stewart.
Fred L. Stewart during his comparatively brief career had gained a high place in banking circles. He was born in Darian, Wisconsin, was educated in the public schools there and at Elsinore, California, attended a commercial college at Los Angeles, and subsequently entered the First National Bank of Elsinore as cashier. He resigned this post to remove to Kelso, Washington, where he became cashier of the Kelso State Bank. Fred L. Stewart died in June, 1921.
J. C. HOOVER came to California in April, 1914, and has established and built up a fine business and a thoroughly expert service as an under- taker and furniture merchant at Corona. He succeeded J. L. Davis there in the spring of 1914. Mr. Davis had established the business about 1900. Mr. Hoover has a store stocked with dependable merchandise in
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the furniture line, and he conducts a fine funeral chapel at 714 Main Street.
Josiah C. Hoover was born at Lockport, New York, August 24, 1866, son of William and Philothea (Crane) Hoover, the former a native of Pennsylvania and the latter of New York State. His father was a car- penter and later a farmer, and died in 1878. The mother survived until 1908.
J. C. Hoover acquired a public school education at Lockport, spent twenty-eight years on his father's farm, and then for eleven years was connected with the Niagara Falls branch of the General Electric Com- pany. While there he helped install and operate the first ten thousand horse power generators in the world.
Leaving the East, Mr. Hoover came to California and soon after- ward engaged in his present business at Corona. He is a licensed em- balmer of New York State, Canada and California. He casts his vote independently, is affiliated with the Masonic Lodge, Royal Arch Chapter and Knights Templar Commandery at Riverside, with Pomona Council, R. and S. M., and the Mystic Shrine. He is also a member of the Inde- pendent Order of Odd Fellows and Knights of Pythias, and belongs to the Chamber of Commerce and Merchants and Manufacturers Associa- tion of Corona.
December 28, 1898, he married Miss Sarah L. Savage, daughter of Johnson L. Savage, of Lockport, where she was born and acquired her public school education. Mr. and Mrs. Hoover have two children, Gladys P. and Leah M., both at home.
CHARLES L. NEWCOMBE is proprietor of the Corona Bottling Works, an important local industry established by the firm of Maxwell & Leibig, subsequently sold to Mr. Dorsey, and since 1919 has been under the owner- ship and direction of Mr. Newcombe. The business involves the bottling of a large and varied line of soft drinks, and the entire product is sold locally.
Mr. Newcombe, who is a widely known business man of this section, was born at Watertown, South Dakota, January 23, 1885, son of Charles Henry and Leora E. (Link) Newcombe, the former a native of St. Thomas, Ontario, Canada, and the latter of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. His parents now reside at Redondo Beach, California, his father being a retired photographer.
Charles L. Newcombe acquired a public school education at St. Paul, Minnesota, and in 1902, at the age of seventeen, came to California. At Los Angeles he served an apprenticeship in a machine shop, was then in an automobile garage, and left that to take up eighty acres. Prior to the war he had a Flying School at Venice, California, and taught stunt and film flying. During the war he was an airplane inspector with the California Aviation Company. Mr. Newcombe in 1918 removed to Corona, entered the garage business, and left that when he took over the Corona Bottling Works.
He is a republican, is affiliated with Corona Lodge No. 291, Knights of Pythias, and is a member of the Chamber of Commerce and the Mer- chants and Manufacturers Association. Octoher 31. 1916, he married Miss Laura A. Allgeyer, daughter of Charles H. Allgeyer, of Anaheim, California. She was born at Anaheim and was educated there, and re- ceived a nurse's training school course at Los Angeles. The only child of Mr. and Mrs. Newcombe, Charles Herman, is deceased.
HARVEY A. LYNN before coming to California had an extensive expe- rience as a railroad traffic man. In California his work has been alto- gether with the general or local divisions of that great marketing
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organization known as the California Fruit Growers Exchange. For the past seven years he has been manager and one of the executive officers of the Arlington Heights Fruit Exchange at Riverside.
Mr. Lynn was born at Warren, Ohio, November 28, 1883, and is a member of one of the oldest families in one of the first settled regions of the Western Reserve of Ohio. The Lynns were of Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry. His father, George F. Lynn, is still living on the old homestead in Trumbull County, Ohio, and has been an active farmer and also a man of influence in local and county affairs. George F. Lynn married Mary A. Kibler, who was born at Warren, Ohio, and is still living within a mile of her birthplace.
Harvey A. Lynn acquired a public school education, and at the age of seventeen left the farm. At Warren while working in a retail store for a year he attended night school and then finished his edu- cation with a commercial training in a business college and supported himself by working in stores during evenings and on Saturdays. After graduating he took a position in the office of the Erie Railroad at Warren, was soon promoted to chief clerk of the local freight office and later was made chief clerk of the division freight office at Mead- ville, Pennsylvania, and continued the duties of that post until he came to California.
In June, 1906, Mr. Lynn came to California to visit his wife's people. He married at Warren June 14, 1905, Miss Iva Mary Risk, who was born in Kent, Ohio. Her father, Robert M. Risk, is a retired farmer who for the past fifteen years has had his home at Santa Monica. Like all people who came to California, Mr. Lynn knew it was the place he wanted for a permanent home. Within a few months he had settled his interests and affairs in Ohio and had located permanently in Southern California. His first home was at Santa Monica, and he was employed in the sales department of the California Fruit Growers Exchange. He removed to Los Angeles in 1907, and for six years continued his duties with the Fruit Exchange in that city, the first three years in the orange department and the last three in the lemon department, and when he left he was assistant lemon sales agent.
Mr. Lynn came to Riverside as manager of the Arlington Heights Fruit Exchange in January, 1914. In the fall of that year this Exchange took over the actual marketing for the Riverside Fruit Exchange, and at that time Mr. Lynn was made secretary-treasurer as well as manager. He is also a director, representing this district on the boards of the California Fruit Growers Exchange and the Fruit Growers Supply Company.
The Riverside Fruit Exchange was incorporated April 27, 1893, being the oldest district exchange in California. The original incor- porators were A. H. Naftzgar, J. B. Crawford, D. W. McLeod, S. C. Evans, Jr., R. W. Meacham, H. A. Westbrook and George Frost, who constituted the first Board of Directors, while others associated with them in the incorporation were M. J. Daniels, Aberdeen Keith, J. Harrison Wright, T. H. B. Chamberlin. The organization con- tinued active until October 7, 1920, at which date was organized the Riverside Arlington Heights Fruit Exchange, taking over the busi- ness of the Riverside and the Arlington Heights Exchanges.
The Arlington Heights Fruit Exchange was incorporated May 17, 1906, and included among the organizers C. E. Rumsey, William Grant Fraser, Mr. Little, James Mills and Reginald Grinsmead. The official board of the company at present is W. G. Fraser, president;
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Henry D. French, vice president ; with C. C. Arnold, L. V. Barnes, J. H. Urquhart, Arthur S. Holden, Alfred Crebbin, directors, and Harvey A. Lynn secretary, treasurer and manager. The business of the Exchange is selling oranges and lemons for a number of grow- ers associations, each association having a representative on the Board of the District Exchange. The marketing is done through the California Fruit Growers Exchange, and seventy-five per cent of the fruit shipped out of the State of California goes through this exchange organization.
Mr. Lynn owns and conducts two orange groves at Riverside, aggregating about eighteen acres, and is a producer as well as an important factor in the marketing facilities. He is a director in the Riverside County Farm Bureau, representing the Citrus Center. Mr. Lynn is a republican voter, a member of Riverside Masonic Lodge, Kiwanis Club and Present Day Club. He and Mrs. Lynn have four children, Robert, Margaret Mary and Frances Lauretta and Betty Lou, twins, all of whom are attending school.
PETER PROVENSAL has been a resident of Southern California nearly half a century, and for the greater part of that time has been active in the business affairs of Riverside County. He is one of the popular resi- dents of Corona, and has given that city one of its distinctive places of entertainment, the French-American restaurant.
Mr. Provensal was born in Northern France, November 11, 1855, son of Peter Provensal. He acquired a public and private school educa- tion, and as a youth learned the baker's trade under his father. In 1875, at the age of twenty, he came to the United States, followed his trade for a time at Los Angeles, and then moved to Riverside, where he was in the retail liquor business. Mr. Provensal has been a business man of Corona since 1892, a period of thirty years. About 1910 he established the Corona Steam Laundry, but sold this property in 1914. The French-American restaurant was started by him in 1915, and is one of the most largely patronized establishments of the kind in the city.
Mr. Provensal is a republican and a member of the Chamber of Com- merce. He has been three times married. In 1881 he married Miss Viola Arcadia Corona, of Los Angeles. His second wife was Rosalie Chambon, of Riverside. In 1914 he married Mary Canore, of Corona. Mr. Pro- vensal has one son, Adolph Joseph, of Los Angeles, and he has several grandchildren.
ELMO HOUGH is secretary and treasurer of the Corona Hardware Company, the oldest and most substantial business of its kind in that city, and one that has had a progressive record of growth through a quarter of a century. This business was established on a modest scale bv W. C. Barth, who for many years was president of the company. About a year later he was joined by George B. MacGillivray, and under the name of Barth & MacGillivray it continued to grow and expand. In April, 1916. Elmo Hough and Charles Marsden acquired an active in- terest in the business, and the executive officers are now E. A. Mac- Gillivray, president, Charles Marsden, vice president, and Elmo Hough, secretary and treasurer. The company is incorporated for $25,000.00. and has a store and warehouses with 7,600 square feet of floor space and does an immense business over practically all of Riverside County. The company carries a complete stock of shelf and heavy hardware, plumbing goods, sheet metal ware, paints and oils, farm implements, electrical appli- ances, sporting goods, and in these lines are represented many of the standard and oldest manufacturing companies in the country.
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Elmo Hough was born at Salina, Kansas, June 1, 1886. His father is I. M. Hough, now engaged in the implement business at Redlands, California. Elmo Hough finished his education at Redlands in the public schools and college there, and for a number of years was associated with the Cope Commercial Company of that city. In April, 1916, he moved to Redlands to take an active share in the present business.
Mr. Hough is first vice president of the Chamber of Commerce, is president of the Merchants and Manufacturers Association of Corona, is a republican, and is affiliated with the Knights of Pythias and the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. His wife is a member of the Methodist Church. July 3, 1910, he married Miss Bessie Blaine Brande- bury, daughter of William Brandebury, of Santa Ana, California. Mrs Hough was born in Ohio and was educated in that state. They have one daughter, Constance Beatrice, at home.
HARRY L. LYMAN is well known in business circles in Riverside Coun- ty, and for the past ten years has been proprietor of the prosperous estab- lishment known as Lyman's Men's Furnishing Goods and Shoe Store at Corona. This business was established a number of years ago by G. B. MacGillivray, who was succeeded by Parsons and he in turn by R. B. Mckinney. Mr. Lyman brought the business from Mr. Mckinney in 1912. It is located at 520 Main Street, and is a store handling some of the most exclusive and standard makes of men's clothing and shoes, including the Style-Plus brand, the goods of the International and Lamm Tailoring Company and the Florsheim and Crossett shoes.
Harry L. Lyman was born in Silver Township, Cherokee County, Iowa, April 4, 1884, son of Willis L. and Mattie A. (Gleason) Lyman. His father was an Iowa farmer until 1903, when he removed to Corona, California, and died in January, 1919. The mother is still living in River- side County. Harry L. Lyman acquired a public school education in Iowa, was with his father on the farm in Cherokee County for one year, and after coming to Corona in 1903 he attended the Riverside Business College and then for two and a half years was in the employ of the Co- rona Hardware Company. He then bought a hardware business in Los Angeles, and after selling it conducted a sporting goods house at Santa Paula. For one year he was in the livery business with his father at Pomona, following which he acquired his present business in Corona.
Mr. Lyman is also deputy county clerk, is a republican, a member of the Congregational Church, is a York Rite Mason and Shriner and an Odd Fellow. He is vice president of the Merchants and Manufacturers Association of Corona, and is also active in the Chamber of Commerce and the Country Club.
December 9, 1906, he married Miss Bessie Brubacher, daughter of Alvin and Frances (Lovelace) Brubacher, of Corona. Mrs. Lyman was born at Storm Lake, Iowa, but was reared and educated in Corona. They have one child, Alvin.
LESTER B. HARRIS is one of the enterprising young merchants of Corona, where he is proprietor of a confectionery and tobacco business which was established as successor to F. A. Perkins about 1900. Mr. Harris bought his interest in the business in May, 1919, soon after leaving his service in the navy. The business has been located at the corner of Sixth and Main streets since 1909, and is a high class establishment, han- dling all kinds of smokers' supplies and serving soft drinks and light lunches.
Mr. Harris was born in Denver, Colorado, June 18, 1897, son of Con- verse E. and Allie (Bowen ) Harris, the former a native of Ohio and the
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latter of Illinois. Converse Harris was formerly in the clothing business at Pomona, California, and since 1908 has been a resident of Corona, where he is engaged in the citrus fruit business. Lester Harris attended public schools at Whittier, Pomona and Corona. In 1917 he entered the employ of the First National Bank of Corona, but six months later, on July 26, 1917, enlisted in Company M of the 160th Regiment of Infantry as a private. He was transferred from the army to the navy, and served until honorably discharged as a first class yeoman on December 26, 1919. Soon after his return to Corona he bought his present business.
Mr. Harris is a member of the American Legion, is a republican, a Methodist, is affiliated with the Elks and Knights of Pythias and is a member of the Chamber of Commerce, Merchants and Manufacturers Association and the Country Club. He married December 29, 1921, Miss Mabel Margaret Arborn, daughter of Mrs. Frances Nunn, of Corona, California. Mrs. Harris is a native of Corona, and was educated in the public and high schools of that city.
JOHN H. REED AND FREDERICK MORRIS REED-While the name of Reed is closely associated with the development of the citrus-grow- ing industry of the Southwest, Frederick Morris Reed has bestowed added laurels upon it by the work he has accomplished through his researches in botany, and he is now a recognized authority on matters pertaining to this science. His name is probably better known to the faculty of the California State University than it is elsewhere, even at Riverside, where he is a grower of citrus fruits, having about fifty acres in oranges and lemons, his home being in the midst of them, at 547 Chicago Avenue. He and his father planted the trees and brought them into bearing, and they constitute an attractive and valuable estate in the northeastern part of the city. Mr. Reed is also a member of the Western Society of Naturalists and is the possessor of a valuable collection of rare plants.
Frederick Morris Reed was born at Mansfield, Ohio, May 29, 1867, a son of the late John H. Reed, formerly an honored resident of Riverside, who passed away February 26, 1920, leaving a son and a daughter, the latter being Lois R., who is the wife of A. C. Pickett, state inspector of fertilizers and insecticides, and an orange grower.
The Reed family is one of the old-established ones of this country, and its members took a constructive part in the early history of the establishment of this government, operating in Massachusetts. From that state during the pioneer period of the history of Ohio Abraham Reed left his New England home and migrated to Portage County, Ohio, where he was one of the first settlers, and his son, Horace Reed, was the first white child born in the township in which he had located. When Abraham Reed left Massachusetts he took with him various belongings, and among them was a packet of apple seeds, which, planted in the fertile soil of Portage County, through careful cultivation, developed into the first orchard of that region, and one of the finest that region has ever known. The original trees, still standing, are still bearing fruit, although considerably over a century has elapsed since the seeds were placed in the ground. The remainder of the farm, which was covered by a dense forest when Abraham Reed secured it, is equally valuable, and from it the differ- ent members of the Reed family have reaped abundantly. There Abraham Reed died, and on it his son Horace spent his entire life
JOHN HENRY REED
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and died in 1888, his widow surviving him until 1898, when she, too, passed away.
John H. Reed was the son of Horace and Lois E. Reed, and he was born on the homestead his grandfather had won from the wilder- ness in Rootstown Township, Portage County, Ohio, in June, 1833. Early evincing more than a usual mentality, his proud parents resolved to give him exceptional educational opportunities, and so following the completion of his studies in the local schools he was entered as a student of the Holbrook Normal School at Lebanon, Ohio, the first institution of its kind in the state, and he was a member of its first graduating class. Owing to the marked ability he displayed in mathematics and languages, the faculty offered him the position in instructor of these branches, and, accepting, he remained there until broader opportunities took him from that historic institution.
In 1858 John H. Reed was united in marriage with Miss Cath- erine S. Morris, of Stark County, Ohio, one of the most highly edu- cated and brilliant women of her day, and an educator of note, to whose influence and assistance Mr. Reed always attributed much of his success in life. She aided her husband in establishing a normal school at Lebanon, Ohio, and she was also her husband's assistant during the seven years he was superintendent of the schools of Mans- field, Ohio. Following his resignation from the educational field, she turned her superior talents in the direction of temperance work, and forwarded the prohibition cause by exceptionally effective efforts in its behalf on the lecture platform. The First Congregational Church of Mansfield, Ohio, also had the benefit of her strenuous work, and after she came to Riverside she participated in many movements which had for their object the betterment of existing conditions and the raising of the highest moral standards. Her death occurred November 17, 1908, and the entire city mourned her passing.
Owing to the fact that he was afflicted with deafness, John H. Reed was forced to retire from educational work, much to the regret of the people of Mansfield, and for a time he was engaged in mer- chandising in that city. Subsequently he moved to Nebraska and settled on a large stock farm, but the climate there was not suited to his health, then delicate, and in 1890 he came to California. For fourteen weeks he traveled in a buckboard and slept in the open air, and eventually reached Riverside, with his health greatly improved. Purchasing ten acres of land, he made this city his permanent home, and not only amassed a comfortable fortune, but fully regained his health and won high appreciation from his fellow men. Later he bought more acreage, planting fifty acres to oranges and lemons and ten acres to deciduous fruits.
Inheriting his grandfather's talents for horticulture, Mr. Reed soon found that he was particularly fitted for fruitgrowing, and not only developed a magnificent grove of his own, but won such a repu- tation as a citrus grower that a number of orchardists asked him to take charge of their groves, and he acquired supreme authority as an expert. He organized the first horticultural club in California, and subsequently branched out, organizing horticultural clubs and farmers' institutes, and these were the forerunners of the present orange grow- ers' associations.
One of the greatest difficulties experienced by the pioneers in the orange industry was that of the decay of the product in storage and long transit to market. With customary zeal Mr. Reed undertook to remedy the evil, appealing to the Department of Agriculture at Wash-
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ington for relief. After several years of energetic effort through cor- respondence Mr. Reed succeeded in having Dr. William A. Taylor, of the Bureau of Plant Industry, sent to Riverside. After a thorough investigation Doctor Taylor returned to Washington, reported favor- ably with reference to Mr. Reed's contentions, and as a result G. Harold Powell, of national repute on these matters, was sent to River- side to take charge of the investigation, and continued there for six years.
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