USA > California > San Bernardino County > History of San Bernardino and Riverside counties, Volume III > Part 16
USA > California > Riverside County > History of San Bernardino and Riverside counties, Volume III > Part 16
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On November 12, 1872, in Iowa, Doctor Foster married Miss Isabel Lanning, who was born in Clinton, Iowa, April 30, 1852, daughter of Samuel and Sarah (Welch) Lanning, the former a native of Newark, New Jersey, and the latter of West Virginia. Mrs. Foster was educated in the public schools of Clinton, Iowa. Dr. and Mrs. Foster had three children. The oldest, M. H. Foster, who was born at Plano, Illinois, October 10, 1874, acquired his education in the Chaffey College, Ontario, California, and now has active charge of the home ranch of forty acres. He is a young business man noted for thoroughness in everything he undertakes, and has made the home ranch one of the notable properties in this vicinity. On May 8, 1901, he married Miss Susie Austin, a native of Kansas, and they are the proud parents of a son, Burton Foster, who was born at Cucamonga February 2, 1921. This heir of the Foster family is a particular idol of his grandmother, Mrs. Foster.
The second of the children is Nell Foster, who was born in Near Clinton, lowa, March 17, 1878, also finished her education in the old Chaffey College at Ontario, and on February 21, 1905, at Los Angeles, was married to Stanley M. Frew, an accountant who now lives in Los Angeles. The third child, Ethel, born in Melbourne, Iowa, March 29, 1885, was educated at Chaffey College, and on April 7, 1906, was married to F. C. Hillyard, who is in the Government service at San Francisco. They have one daughter, Beth Loraine, born April 12, 1918.
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About six years after Doctor Foster's death, Mrs. Foster bought her present home on West Ninth Street in Upland, where she is living retired, her son operating the home ranch. Doctor Foster was a member of the Masonic Fraternity.
M. H. BORDWELL has had an interested and helpful part in practically the entire history of the thriving little City of Upland, going there when the scattered settlements were still known as North Ontario. Throughout this period he has been identified with the commercial side of the fruit industry.
Mr. Bordwell was born in Calhoun County, Michigan, October 6, 1849, son of David B. and Martha B. Bordwell, who were natives of New York State. Of their three sons H. W. and L. C. are now deceased. M. H. Bord- well grew up on his father's farm, and secured a common school educa- tion. In the intervals of his schooling he worked in the fields and about the home, and that made up the routine of his life until he was twenty-one. After about a year he was employed in an agricultural implement business at Marshall, Michigan. In 1880 he moved west to Madison County, Nebraska. In Nebraska Mr. Bordwell had some more extensive relations with business affairs, buying and shipping livestock and at times was a participant in several mercantile ventures. He lived in that state ten years, and early in 1890 came to California. For a time he and his family resided at Riverside, but soon joined the colony at Upland.
Mr. Bordwell and Mr. Fawsett formed a partnership to buy and dry green fruit, and developed an extensive business as dealers and shippers of dried fruit out of this district. Eventually their business was sold to a newly organized corporation, the Ontario Packing Company, of which Mr. Bordwell was one of the founders and in which he has been a director from the beginning. He is still buyer for his district. This company has branches throughout Southern California, with main offices in Los Angeles. Mr. Bordwell was also one of the early members of the Magnolia Mutual Building & Loan Association at Upland, was a director, and the nineteenth annual report names him as secretary and treasurer, the position he has filled for a number of years. He is a director in the Citizens Savings Bank, a life-long republican and a member of the Presbyterian Church. Mr. Bordwell is a plain, unpretentious busi- ness man, and yet his associates recognize him as one of the colony's steadily helpful and loyal members, always ready to do his part in advanc- ing the best interests of the community.
On November 29, 1876, he married Miss Judith J. Aldrich, also a native of Calhoun County, Michigan. Their only son is Reid B. Bord- well, who was born June 29, 1882, at Madison, Nebraska. He received most of his education in Upland, where he attended the high school, also took a business course in the Chaffey College at Ontario, and is an accountant by profession. Though not subject to the draft at the time and with a wife and child he volunteered July 1, 1918, at Los Angeles, and was assigned to Battery A, Fourth Regiment, Field Artillery. He received his honorable discharge December 20, 1918. In 1907 he married Beatrice Cerry, a native of London, Canada. They have one daughter Judith Louise Bordwell born June 11, 1908.
MINNIE DENISON GOODRICH .- The family names of Denison and Goodrich have been identified with development work and the good citizenship of the Upland section of San Bernardino County for thirty-five years. Lands have been leveled, cleared and planted, orange groves developed, homes established through the instru-
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mentality of these families. Mrs. Minnie Goodrich is the widow of the late John B. Goodrich, a hard working and thrifty citizen whose name is held in the highest respect in this community.
Mrs. Goodrich was born near Oil City, Pennsylvania, March 27, 1873, daughter of B. S. and Florence Denison. In 1874, the year following her birth, her parents moved to Newport, Kentucky, where her father was a merchant until 1886. For some time he had suffered ill health, and his physicians advised him that the only possible means of restoring his strength was to seek the milder climate of Southern California. Accordingly in 1886 he traded his Newport property for a tract of ten acres in what was then known as North Ontario, now Upland. This land was on Twenty-first Street, near Euclid Avenue. The Santa Fe Railroad had not yet built to Upland, and the nearest railroad station was at Ontario. The Denisons were pioneers in fact, since most of the land was wild, covered with sage brush, and the plantings had been chiefly in deciduous fruit and grapes. The land acquired by Mr. Denison had been set to deciduous fruits, but he later developed it as an orange grove. Some years later he and his three older children left California and went to Honolulu. Mr. Denison is now eighty-three years of age and is still active, with his two sons, in the railroad and transportation business in the Hawaiian Islands.
Miss Minnie Denison was thirteen years of age when she came to California, and she finished her education in a one room school building on Eighteenth Street, being one of the three girls and seven boys who made up the scholarship enrollment of the colony at that time. Later she attended the Normal School at Los Angeles.
On September 28, 1889, Miss Denison was married to John B. Goodrich. The late Mr. Goodrich was a native of Beaver Dam, Wisconsin. His father was a hard working farmer in that state, and, needing the assistance of his children, he took his son out of school at the age of thirteen and put him to work on the farm. John B. Goodrich after leaving home managed to get an academic education and also studied privately, and in that way procured a substantial equipment for life's work. On coming to California he bought ten acres on West Sixteenth Street at Upland, and cleared, leveled and set this to citrus fruits. He also erected a substantial home, in which he and Mrs. Goodrich lived until it was destroyed by fire September 15, 1917. He then replaced it with the modern home where Mrs. Goodrich resides. From this house is obtained an unrivalled view of the valley below. Mr. Goodrich, who died October 15, 1920, had the quality of industry, was a good manager, and thoroughly inter- ested in the welfare of others outside his immediate family. While improving his own holdings he acted as caretaker for the groves of other owners, and for seven years served as horticultural inspector for the district. He was a member of the Masonic order.
Since his death Mrs. Goodrich has taken over the business manage- ment of the property and has kept her younger children in school. Mrs. Goodrich was the fourth in a family of seven children, named George, Bertha, Harry, Minnie, Julia, Lee and Mary. The four oldest children are still living. Mrs. Goodrich has four children: Helen, born January 1, 1904, now in the senior year in the Chaffey High School at Ontario; Bertha, born at Upland April 8, 1906, in the sopho- more year of high school; Harland, born September 3, 1908; and
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Landon, born September 13, 1911. Mrs. Goodrich is a member of the Presbyterian Church.
DATUS E. MYERS was born at Harrison, Ohio, March 15, 1842, and died in Riverside, California, May 30, 1919. He was the son of Henry and Martha Myers, who were both natives of Pennsylvania.
Those were pioneer days in Ohio, when the waterways were the only highroads and most of the early settlers came to this rich and virgin wilderness by way of the Ohio River, with their few worldly goods on a raft. In such manner the parents of Mr. Myers arrived and cast in their lot with the early settlers of Cincinnati, where in a nearby village Mr. Myers was born. He was the youngest of twelve children, and his early life was full of the constructive influences of those pioneer days. No person can successfully form a character without overcoming obstacles, especially one of Mr. Myers' virile and keen mind. Through the loss of inherited property this large family of children were forced to face the world and battle with it. Datus Myers, being the youngest and last at home, had to not only carve his own way but help to take care of his old parents. Boy that he was, he assumed the task with a dauntless courage, and although he had to give up hope of further schooling, yet he never for one moment permitted that to interfere with his education. An omniverous reader and with a perfect memory, he proceeded to use every spare moment in the company of the best and most profound books, to such good purpose that in the evening of his life, after he had retired from business, he spent his time in study and writing- his mind growing more wonderful and brilliant with each succeeding year.
He made a very exhaustive study of the history of the North American Indian and the book which he wrote on the subject was accepted by one of the leading publishing houses, but on account of war conditions it was not published. His last book was a discussion of practical civics, but the same conditions obtained and the book was never printed.
As a young man and growing with his years the quality of patriotism was developed to its highest point. At the outbreak of the Civil war he promptly enlisted on the side of the Union and fought with the Eighty-third Ohio Volunteer Infantry for three years. During one of the hardest engagements he carried not only his own colors but those of the Twenty-third Wisconsin, whose color bearers had been shot down again and again. Catching up the flag as it was going down, he rallied the men of the Wisconsin Regiment to a final charge. For this act of bravery he was given a furlough to carry the Wisconsin colors back to the organization that presented them, and they are now at the State House in Madison.
After his return from the war he went up the Mississippi River by steamboat to claim his bride, Ida Louise Watkins. They were married on September 6, 1865. Four daughters were born to them, two of whom, Mrs. H. A. Atwood and Miss Julia Myers, together with Mrs. Myers, survive him.
Mr. Myers was a man who thought big thoughts and engaged in big things. His career in the real estate business was marked by big ventures, which finally won him a competence. As superintendent of a men's reformatory in St. Cloud, Minnesota, he worked out policies that put him in the first rank with penologists: as a politician he cared nothing for place but loved to play the game; as a citizen he
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stood for the highest and best. He loved California and Riverside, and many years ago made the decision that this was to be the home in his declining years and his final resting place.
The most striking characteristic of Mr. Myers was his dauntless courage-the courage of the losing fight, and to the end he faced life and all its exigencies with an unconquered spirit.
REV. T. J. FITZGERALD One of the best loved men in Redlands is Father Fitzgerald, who for nearly thirty years has been the spiritual head of the Catholic parish here, and is esteemed almost equally by Protestants as well as among his own church people. It is per- mitted to set down some of his impressions gained from his long experience here.
"San Bernardino County pioneers compare favorably with up- builders in any part of the state. It has been the good fortune of some of us to hear from their own lips the accounts of hardships en- dured and dangers encountered that success might come to their labors. The hardy pioneers were brave workers. They had a pur- pose in life, and they put all their energies, mental and physical, to the attainment of that purpose.
"Redlands is, I am sure, the pride of San Bernardino County. Few places in the whole world have such natural attractions as Red- lands. A friend of mine once met a world renowned traveler on the top of Mount Riga. This friend questioned the traveler as to the most beautiful place he had seen. After thinking a little while he said 'the most beautiful spot I have ever seen is a little place called Redlands in San Bernardino County, California, America.' This friend communicated this information to me, and my response was 'I have always thought so.'
"I came to Redlands twenty-seven years ago last June, and from that day to this it has always been 'young and fair to me.' In a humble, small, obscure way nothing has been left undone by me, on my part, to aid in upbuilding the town. In that time our lot and labors have been cast chiefly among the poorer element of the town. The Catholic priest, like the church to which he belongs, takes an in- terest in everything that tends to the upbuilding of mankind, he ex- cludes no one from his ministrations. His own, of course, are his direct and immediate care; and in caring for his own his attention is constantly and chiefly directed to things moral and things associated with morality. The Trinity of the world's progress is the home, the school and the church. These are placed in the order of their im- portance, though they affect each other as part of one great whole, and they act and reach out one to the other. The Catholic Church be- lieves in the absolute necessity of religious training for children, so side by side with the church goes the school. The school is set up to add religion to the daily training of the child. Redlands has many fine schools, and very efficient teachers, and the schools have grown in every way in the past twenty years. Catholics are proud to take their place as educators.
"Beginning with a mere handful-exactly one dozen-our school kept growing, so that today we have two schools, with an attendance of two hundred and fifty children. The Catholic Church in Red- lands has been enlarged three times since it was first built. It has a membership of twelve hundred."
The pastor may be set down as one of the pioneers of the county. He was born in Kerry, Ireland, October 25, 1857. He received his
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primary education in the local schools and a private school conducted by the Fathers of St. Dominic. At St. Brendan's Seminary, Killarney, he received his preparatory training for four years, and from there entered the great university of Maynooth. After seven years he completed a post-graduate course and was ordained to the priesthood in 1883. His first missionary labors were in Scotland.
In 1887 he was called home to his native parish, but after a year of labor his health failed and he set out for Colorado. The climate was very beneficial for his lung trouble, but the altitude soon pro- duced hemorrhages, and in 1893 he left Colorado and came to Cali- fornia, settling first at Beaumont and then in San Bernardino County. The following year, at the request of Father Stockman, a venerable pioneer, he took charge at Redlands. This was then a small place, and there were few Catholics. However, Father Fitzgerald accepted it and has stayed with it since then. Considerable success has at- tended his work, and it has attracted the appreciation of his ecclesi- astical superiors. Other and larger charges were offered, but he refused them, determined to keep the little place where he began.
In 1920 Pope Benedict raised him to the dignity of a Domestic Prel- ate and this was followed by making him a Prothonotary Apostolic, the highest dignity in the power of the Pontiff to bestow. All the same, the old Father remains unchanged. He is still preaching, teaching, and waiting cheerfully on the sick and suffering.
REV. JOHN B. TOOMAY, pastor of Bethel Congregational Church at Ontario, has rounded out a career of a quarter of a century of faithful work in the ministry, and is known as one of the able thinkers and public leaders of San Bernardino County.
Rev. Mr. Toomay was born in Ray County, Missouri, in 1868, son of Edward and Martha Toomay. His father was a native of Cork, Ireland, came to America in early life and served as a soldier in the Civil war. The mother belonged to a family of Missouri pioneers who went to that state from Tennessee.
Rev. John B. Toomay was an A. B. graduate from Otterbein University in Ohio, and subsequently received his Bachelor of Divinity degree from Yale College. Of the twenty-five years he has spent in the ministry fifteen were years of labor in church building and preaching in Missouri, while for ten years his duties have lain in California. He has been pastor of the Congregational Church at Ontario for the past four years. Two years ago he built an attractive home in Ontario, and his parents, now over eighty years of age, live with him.
Mr. Toomay was camp pastor at Camp Kearney for a short time during the late war, and was prominent in all war activities during the term of the war. Among other duties he is probation officer for the west end of San Bernardino County. He is a member of the El Camino Real Club, made up of local educators and thinkers. He is a Mason and a member of the progressive wing of the republican party. Rev. Mr. Toomay is widely traveled, and a number of years ago he. went abroad for an extensive tour of the Mediterranean coun- tries, in the course of which he visited the cities of Rome and Athens and also Constantinople, Egypt, and the Holy Land.
At Westerville, Ohio, in 1891, he married Miss Minnie O. Bender, daughter of Daniel Bender, of Ohio. Mrs. Toomay died at Ontario in 1919. She is survived by a daughter, Helen Toomay, now a student in Pomona College. Recently Rev. Mr. Toomay married Inez Craw-
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ford. a returned missionary from Japan. She is a daughter of John Crawford, a well known pioneer of Southern California. Mrs. Toomay has lived at Ontario since she was two years of age except for the two years she spent in her missionary labors in Japan.
WILLIAM B. CULROSS .- While almost every branch of industrial and commercial activity is well represented in San Bernardino County. it must be admitted that those connected with the production and marketing of fruits are of paramount importance. as this is especially a fruit-growing section of the country. Much stress has been laid upon the energy. foresight and aggressiveness of the men who are devoting themselves to the deciduous industry, and the half has not been told, but the same is equally true of those who afford a market for the products of the orchards and bring the producer into contact with the marts of trade. One of the men whose entire life has been spent in this line of work is William B. Culross. of Colton, who is now manager of the Colton plant of the Golden State Canneries. a man known all over this part of the state as an exponent of effective- ness and sound business methods.
William B. Culross was born at Rochester. New York. August 27. 1882. and comes of Colonial stock on his mother's side. and of Scotch descent on his father's side. He is a son of careful parents who sent him to school at Rochester for a couple of years, but in 1890 the family came to California and settled at San Bernardino, where they spent a year. the lad attending the San Bernardino schools. In 1893 a return was made to Rochester. but in 1894 the family once more came to California, and took up permanent residence at Rialto. William B. Culross had two more years in the San Bernardino schools and a year in the Riverside Business College, and then was ready for his contact with the actualities of life. He became associated with A. Gregory, an orange grower and shipper at Redlands, as stenog- rapher. and in this connection learned one end of the business, so that when he came to Colton it was as secretary of the Gregory Fruit Company, and he held that position until the concern was absorbed by the Golden State Canneries, at which time he was made manager of the Colton plant, and still holds this responsible position. While he votes the republican ticket. he has never concerned himself greatly about politics. but when elected to the Colton City Council rendered such efficient service to his ward and city that he has been re-elected several times and is now serving his ninth consecutive year in that body. the last seven years being the presiding officer. He is a Mason.
In 1906 Mr. Culross married at Colton Miss Effie Gilbert, the ceremony being celebrated on the day of the San Francisco earth- quake. Mrs. Culross is a native of Iowa and a daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Elmer E. Gilbert, of Colton. Mr. and Mrs. Culross have two daughters. Ada and Bertha. The leading characteristic displayed by Mr. Culross is dependability. With it he possesses ability. persistency and sincerity. and never goes into anything unless he heartily believes in it and is certain that its successful termination will be of lasting good to the majority. He is deservedly popular. and stands very high in public confidence.
FRED W. FRENCH .- After a broad and general successful business experience in the East Fred W. French came to California with his family in 1911, and after a few years entered the real estate business.
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He is now senior member of French-Spangler Realty Company at San Bernardino.
Mr. French was born at Paulding, Ohio, November 20. 1867. son of Andrew Y. and Lottie B. French. His father had to his credit a record of four and a half years' service as a Union soldier in the Civil war. He first enlisted when about fifteen years of age. Fred W. French grew up at Paulding. graduated from high school there in 1882. and took a commercial course in the Valparaiso Normal School of Indiana. For ten years he had the experience of a bookkeeper and stenographer in Chicago. Returning to Paulding in 1893. Le was in the newspaper business there three years. and for seven years conducted a mercantile establishment. In 1904 Mr. French removed to Defiance. Ohio, where he was again in the general merchandise business.
When he came to California in 1911 he located on an orange grove at Rialto, but in 1914 moved to San Bernardino and became associated with C. M. Dalldorf in the real estate business. Their partnership was dissolved in June, 1916, and since then Mr. French has been associated with Preston A. Spangler in the firm of French-Spangler Realty Company, real estate, loans and insurance. It is one of the leading firms of the kind in San Bernardino County.
Mr. French for many years has been a Knight Templar Mason and Elk and is a past exalted ruler of the Elks. He became affiliated with the Presbyterian Church in Ohio, but after coming to California transferred his membership to the Congregational Church at Rialto and later to the Congregational Church at San Bernardino. Mr. French resides at 332 Magnolia Street. with his two children. Cecil S. and Kathleen French Chapin, both of whom are employed in the business life of San Bernardino.
Cecil S. French. born in 1890. at Paulding. Ohio, has lived in California since 1911. and for the last four years has been in the employ of the Santa Fe Railway Company. Kathleen French Chapin was born in 1895 at Paulding. graduated from the Defiance, Ohio. High School in 1911. and in the same year came to California. She completed a commercial course in a business college in 1915. and has since been connected with the Farmers Exchange National Bank of San Bernardino.
PRESTON A. SPANGLER was born in Delaware County. Ohio. August 17. 1865. a son of John L. and Mary L. Spangler. He received only a district school education, and engaged as clerk in a dry goods business at the age of fifteen. He followed the same occupation until failure of health. and came to California with his widowed mother and wife in October. 1901. Engaging at that time in the life insurance business in Los Angeles. he followed the same line until May. 1916. when he became associated with F. W. French in the real estate business in San Bernardino, California.
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