USA > California > San Bernardino County > History of San Bernardino and Riverside counties, Volume III > Part 19
USA > California > Riverside County > History of San Bernardino and Riverside counties, Volume III > Part 19
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About twenty years ago he found his own orange grove demanding most of his time. This program, briefly outlined, indicates that Mr. Horton has applied himself to the practical side of the life of this community, and has done a great deal of hard physical work as well as employed the best resources of his mind. Through such program he has been able to accumulate his personal means and educate his children.
Mr. and Mrs. Horton had four children. The oldest, G. Ray Horton, who was born at Marengo, Iowa, December 14, 1875, grad- uated A. B. from Pomona College in 1898, and for seven or eight years was one of the brilliant young newspaper men of Los Angeles. He was reporter and member of the editorial staff of the Los Angeles Times and the Examiner, and while doing court reporting he became interested in the law, and studied in Senator Flint's offices and attended law school at night. Senator Flint gave him the manage- ment of Bradstreet and Dun's collection department. Thus he paid his way until his admission to the bar, and was at once made assistant district attorney under Captain John D. Fredericks, of Los Angeles County. Later he was assistant prosecutor in Federal Courts, and finally became assistant district attorney in the last term of Mr. Fred- ericks as county prosecutor. He was one of the staff of attorneys actively engaged in the effort to select a jury in the famous trial of McNamara brothers. He early entered a partnership with Robert P. Jennings, and the law firm of Jennings & Horton took the highest rank in the Los Angeles bar. Ray Horton was noted for his ability in criminal practice. He was attaining rapidly some of the highest honors, and emoluments of the legal profession when he was called by death January 4, 1915. In June, 1902, he married Miss Jessie Balch, a native of Indiana, and is survived by two children, Helen Balch Horton, born January 11, 1904, and Georgie Ray Horton, born March 4, 1914.
The second child of Mr. Horton is Minnie May Horton, who was born in Mahaska County, Iowa. March 18, 1877, was educated in Pomona College and the State Normal School at Los Angeles, and for seven years she and her mother were successfully engaged in the millinery business at Ontario. On December 20, 1904, at Ontario, California, she was married to Robert G. Shoenberger, and they have one daughter, Theresa, born September 10, 1911. The third child, Hattie Elmyra Horton, was born June 2, 1879, in Guthrie County, Iowa, and died February 18, 1880. The youngest of the family, Lena Jane Horton, born in Guthrie County, Iowa, April 12, 1882, was educated in California and on October 14, 1903, was mar- ried to Albert W. Butterfield, who died October 31, 1921. Mrs. Butter- field has one child, John W., born at the home of his grandparents in Ontario in 1904. A. W. Butterfield was an electrician and had charge of the entire electrical system for the Southwest Cotton Company, a corporation owning the Goodyear Rubber Company's holdings in Arizona.
John M. Horton has been a life-long republican. From his expe- rience he can give a consecutive account of the development of Ontario for over thirty-five years. When he first came here there was only one ten acre tract solidly set to oranges in the entire colony. He has never been a speculator, and economy and industry have enabled him to gather together sufficient of this world's goods to insure his comfort. He has recently disposed of one of his orange groves. He and his family are members of the Congregational Church. He is
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a member of the Woodmen of the World. Both hie and his wife are members of The Women of Woodcraft.
THOMAS MONKS is an old time resident of the Ontario community, and his hightly improved home and estate is located on Turner Avenue, half a mile south of Salt Lake Railway. Perhaps no other resident of this section has had a richer or more varied experienced of real pioneer times than Mr. Monks. He knew this country more than fifty years ago, and his personal industry has been a factor in redeem- ing the desert and the wilderness.
He was born at Williamsport, Pennsylvania, July 19, 1851, son of Thomas and Mary (Fritz) Monks. When he was four years of age his mother died, leaving four children, John, George, Thomas and Annie. Thomas Monks, Sr., then married a widow with four children, and to the second union were born three other children, two sons, now deceased, and one daughter, still living. Thomas Monks, Sr., in 1861, when his son Thomas was ten years of age, moved out to Iowa. He lived there as a farmer three years, and in the spring of 1864 left for California in a wagon train, his part of the equipment being two two-horse teams and wagons. When the family came into California four horses were drawing one wagon. They came through Austin, Nevada, where three of the children, John, George and Annie, remained, and the others came on to Sacramento and a year later moved to Sonoma County. In Sonoma County Thomas Monks went to work on the dairy ranch of G. A. Collins. He accompanied his father's family to Southern California in the fall of 1867, to San Bernardino, and Mr. Monks for four or five years was a hand on the dairy and stock ranch of Mr. Collins in the neighborhood of San Jacinto. From here he went to Ventura, and from his work in that section made a good stake. Following that he was at Riverside two years, at San Bernardino eight or ten years, and he rented a ranch and also worked on the ranch of Dick Stuart.
On New Year's Day 1885 Mr. Monks married Miss Jessie White, a native of Ohio. After his marriage he took charge of Dick Stuart's ranch until it was sold, and he then removed to Stuart's ranch at Rincon. In 1889 Mr. Monks bought twenty acres of desert land on what is now Turner Avenue, and here he erected as his first home a little house 16x16 feet. This house occupied about the site on which his now modern and complete home stands. The spring after purchasing Mr. Monks set this to Muscat grapes, and he tried drying the grapes for raisins, but was inexpert in that business and subse- quently he sold them green to the Guasti winery, getting six dollars a ton one year and later fifteen dollars a ton. This price was paid half on delivery and half six months later. In subsequent years Mr. Monks made a good compensation out of his wine grapes. To the original twenty acres he added until he now has sixty acres highly developed to vineyard and deciduous fruits. He bought this as part of the Cucamonga desert land. There was no water even for domestic purposes, and for several years he hauled drinking water. He was impelled to make the purchase of this desert land because it was cheap, about twenty-five dollars an acre, and he was not well enough off to purchase any of the high priced irrigated lands. He would now refuse five hundred dollars an acre for his tract. It was a difficult problem to pay even for his desert land, and the payments he met by doing hard work for others, frequently receiving wages of only a dollar and a half a day and boarding himself. Through this strenuous
Vol. 111-9
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period he met his payments, and also reared and educated his family. His has been a life full of work, long hours, privations, and, until com- paratively recent years, luxuries were few. Now well along on the easy street of life, there are none who could begrudge his well earned prosperity.
Mrs. Monks was born July 1, 1866, and was educated in the public schools of West Riverside, California, she having come to Riverside at age of ten years with her mother. They have previously lived in Owatonna, Steele County, Minnesota. Her mother died when Mrs. Monks was fifteen years old, and she then made her home with Mr. Ben Ables, of Riverside, and later with Mr. and Mrs. Richard Stewart of San Bernardino.
Three children were born to Mr. and Mrs. Monks. The oldest, Annie, born November 9, 1886, in San Bernardino, was educated in the common schools and the Riverside High School and is the wife of Walter Joy, a native of Illinois and living at Collins, California. The second child, Henry, born July 27, 1889, at Rincon, was educated in the public schools, is a graduate of the Pomona Business College and for ten years was head bookkeeper for the O K orange fruit exchange of Upland and now has charge of his father's ranch. He also has forty acres of his own. He is unmarried. Mary Monks, born on the homestead December 4, 1891, was educated in Ontario, is a graduate of the Pomona Business College, and for two years was employed by the Hot Point Electric Plant at Ontario as a stenographer and typist. In 1912 she was married to Mr. Logan Nettle, a native of Missouri. They have one child, Maxine Nettle, born October 8, 1913.
JAMES R. POLLOCK has in a characteristically unassuming way wielded large and benignant influence in connection with the social and mate- rial progress of Ontario, one of the attractive little cities of San Bernardino County, is a lawyer by profession, has served in various offices of public trust in this community, and has been identified with the upbuilding of a number of institutions of important order in a financial way.
James Rogers Pollock was born in Washington County, Pennsyl- vania, July 24, 1865, and is a son of Alexander W. and Mary J. (Moore) Pollock, both of remote Scotch ancestry. The public schools of the old Keystone State afforded Mr. Pollock his early education, which was supplemented by his attending the Pennsyl- vania State Normal School and later the historic old Washington and Jefferson College, in which excellent Pennsylvania institution he was graduated as a member of the class of 1890 and with the degree of Bachelor of Arts. His course in preparation for the legal profession was taken in the law department of Buffalo University in the City of Buffalo, New York.
Mr. Pollock has been a resident of San Bernardino County since 1896, has given more or less of his time and attention to the practice of law, served as justice of the peace at Ontario from 1904 to 1919, and in the meanwhile served also, from 1904 to 1914, as city recorder. For ten years he was president of the San Antonio Hospital Associa- tion, at Ontario, this county ; he was for eight years president of the Ontario National Bank, of which he is still a stockholder and chairman of the board; and he is at the present time a director of the Pioneer Title Insurance Company and also of the Ontario Bond & Mortgage Company, to which two important and prosperous institutions he gives much of his time and energy. Mr. Pollock has taken deep and
Prin Portes
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loyal interest in everything touching the welfare of his home city of Ontario and of San Bernardino County, and his influence and effective co-operation have been given in the furtherance of measures and enterprises advanced for the general good of the community. He has had no ambition for political activity but is a staunch and well fortified advocate of the principles of the republican party. Both he and his wife are active members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, as was also his first wife.
At Dungannon, County Tyrone, Ireland, was solemnized the mar- riage of Mr. Pollock and Miss Kate L. McCormick, and his bride accompanied him on his return to the United States. She passed to the life eternal in the year 1905, and left one son, Thomas A. Pollock. In 1908 Mr. Pollock wedded Miss Annie D. Walls in the City of Los Angeles, and she is the popular chatelaine of their attractive home at Ontario, besides being prominent in the representative social life of the community.
ORIN PORTER was a resident of Redlands more than twenty years. While here he showed his substantial faith in the community by invest- ing liberally of his means in orchard property, and was deeply interested as well in the full rounded development of the community. Mr. Porter spent his life largely in the great West, and for years was a noted au- thority on mining operations.
He was a New Englander by birth and ancestry, born at Troy in Orleans County, Vermont, in 1838. He grew up in the rugged district of New England, and at the age of seventeen went out to the new state of Iowa. He lived there four years and then returned East, and again spent six years in Vermont. When he finally left the East his journey ended in Nevada, and he participated in the great mining excitement at White Pine during 1868. There he served his apprenticeship as a practical miner and prospector, and his next scene of operations was in Idaho. He was interested in both gold and silver mines, and long ex- perience made him an expert in every phase of prospecting, developing and the production of precious metals. For twenty-five years he gave his personal time and supervision to his mining interests, and when he retired he located at Redlands and bought two ten-acre orange groves. Eventually he became owner of forty acres, and took a very enthusiastic interest in every department of the citrus fruit growing and made the business a profitable one.
The death of this honored citizen of Redlands occurred April 19, 1914. He was a member of the Masonic Order, attended the Con- gregational Church and was very active in all lines of betterment work around the colony and had the greatest of faith in the future of the en- tire Redlands district.
In 1891 he married Sarah M. G. Rogers, also a native of Vermont. She attended public school at Fairfax and was also a student of New Hampton Institute, at Fairfax. a Baptist college which has since been renamed and endowed as the Bellows Seminary. Mr. Porter is survived by Mrs. Porter and one daughter, Ora, who was born at Redlands Feb- ruary 5, 1893. Miss Ora Porter attended Mrs. Winston's private school and at the time of her father's death was a student in the University of Redlands, taking a musical course. Later she finished her vocal education as a private pupil in Los Angeles under the teacher and singer Estelle Hartt Dreyfus. Miss Ora Porter was married March 25, 1918, to Ira Leroy Thomason. Mr. Thomason was born in Nebraska May 23. 1895, and graduated A. B. from Stanford University in California and
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was in the university taking his law course when he entered the army, joining the Ordnance Department at Palo Alto, May 10, 1918. He was at Camp Hancock, Georgia, later transferred to the infantry and sent to the Officers Training Camp at Camp Gordon, Georgia, and after the signing of the armistice received his discharge December 20, 1918. He and his family now live at Hollywood, California, where he is head of the publicity department of the Hollywood branch of the Security Trust and Savings Bank of Los Angeles. Mr. and Mrs. Thomason have one daughter, Dorothy Jean, born January 31, 1919, at Redlands.
Mrs. Porter continues to make her home at Redlands, on Wabash Street, and is the efficient manager of the original twenty-acre home- stead acquired by Mr. Porter some thirty years ago.
JOSEPH D. MERIWETHER has for a number of years been a successful nurseryman in Ontario, and acquired his early training in the world's greatest nursery, at Louisiana, Missouri, where he was born August 30, 1873.
Mr. Meriwether is a son of Joseph and Laura M. (Turner) Meri- wether. The Meriwether family is of noted Virginia ancestry, one branch of the family being represented by the Meriwether Lewis, who was one of the famous Lewis & Clark expedition to the North- west.
Joseph D. Meriwether received a public school education in Louisi- ana, attended McCune College there, and immediately after leaving school he entered the service of Stark Brothers at Louisiana, said to be the largest nursery in the world. He was with Stark Brothers for eighteen years, and then removed to California, and is now with the Armstrong Nurseries. He owns and occupies a handsome bun- galow at 215 East G Street.
Mr. Meriwether is strictly a business man, and outside of his business he finds his enjoyment in home, much of his leisure being taken up with reading, particularly history. He has never aspired to hold any public office of any kind, votes as an independent, and has held several chairs in the Masonic and Odd Fellows fraternities. He is a member of the Presbyterian Church.
At St. Louis, Missouri, March 14, 1894, he married Miss Laura Seamens, daughter of Albert Seamens. They have three sons, Albert J., Edward W. and Leslie S.
JOHN G. BEESLEY, an honored resident of Ontario, California, is retired from business, and is diverting the ample means acquired during his active career to the enjoyment of the many comforts presented by residence in this favorite section of Southern California.
Mr. Beesley was born at Bury, St. Edmonds, England, January 6, 1851, son of Richard and Mary Beesley. His early childhood and most of his mature career were spent in Ontario, Canada, where he completed his education, and where for several years he was engaged in building and contracting. Later he became postmaster of Marl- borough, Saskatchewan, Canada, and he had been engaged in farming there previously.
Mr. Beesley as an American citizen has affiliated with the repub- lican party. He has held various chairs in the lodges of Masons and Odd Fellows and is a Shriner and in church relationship is a Methodist.
At Clinton, Ontario, Canada, he married Elizabeth Crosier, daughter of William Crosier. At Riverside, California, June 10, 1921,
Sarah M Porter
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he married Aida Bell, daughter of William and Sarah Bell, her father an electrician and automobile mechanic. Mr. Beesley's children are: Arthur, of Moosejaw, Saskatchewan, Canada; William R., also of Moosejaw, Canada ; John Wesley, of Tueford, Saskatchewan, Canada ; Annie Maude, deceased ; Bertha, wife of J. R. Sparrow, of Moosejaw, Canada ; Mabel, wife of Frank Miller, of Swift Current, Saskatchewan, Canada. Mr. and Mrs. Beesley reside at 311 East C Street, in one of the many choice homes of the beautiful City of Ontario. Mr. Beesley has reached the age of seventy and, while retired from business, he has the spirit and vigor of a man many years his junior.
OTTO S. ROEN is one of the younger and progressive business element of Ontario. He had a technical education and for a number of years was connected with public utility management both in the East and after coming to Ontario, was then associated with a very prosperous wholesale grain and feed business at Ontario, and since January 1, 1922, has been city service manager of Ontario.
Mr. Roen was born at Columbus, Nebraska, February 28, 1884, son of Ole T. and Marion H. Roen, the former a native of Norway and the latter of Massachusetts. Ole S. Roen was the oldest of a family of two sons and three daughters. He graduated from the Columbus High School and for three years was a student in the Armour Institute of Technology at Chicago.
He left that school in 1903 and in 1907 became manager of the Columbus Gas Company in his home town. This position he resigned in 1910 and, locating at Ontario, California, became associated with the Ontario-Upland Gas Company as secretary and treasurer. In April, 1918, this public utility was sold to the Southern Counties Gas Company. Mr. Roen then joined forces with W. T. Ross, and they bought the Ontario feed and fuel business which had been established thirty years ago by Lee and McCarthy. From the restrictions imposed by the war period this business leaped forward during the past three years, each year representing a big increase over the preceding. In 1920 the firm did more than $200,000 worth of business. They handled both wholesale and retail grain, feed and fuel.
In 1918 Mr. Roen married Miss Dorothy J. Harper, of a well known Ontario family. She was born in that town and is a graduate of the Chaffee Union High School and the State Normal, and for four years was a teacher in the grammar school before her marriage. They have one son, Charles Roen, born in Ontario in October, 1919.
Mr. Roen at the time of the World war applied for duty in the gas and flame service, was drafted and ordered to the colors in the aviation department. He was under orders to entrain for Kelly Field, Texas, but the train was late and while waiting he was notified of the signing of the armistice.
EMMETT A. BOYLAN spent his early life in Kansas, chiefly as a teacher, but for a number of years has enjoyed some important responsibilities at Corona as manager of the Sparr Fruit Company.
He was born at White Rock, Kansas, January 26, 1884, son of John E. and Mary E. (Lock) Boylan. His parents are now living in Oregon, his father being a retired farmer. Mr. Boylan is a direct descendant of Edward Lock and Stonewall Jackson, and therefore of prominent Virginia ancestry.
Emmett A. Boylan acquired a public school education in Republic City and Belleville, Kansas, and was a member of the class of 1902
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in the Kansas Agricultural College at Manhattan. The vocation and duties of teaching engaged him for six years.
Mr. Boylan came to Corona, California, in 1907, and since that time has been the managing official of the Sparr Fruit Company. He is a republican in politics, a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church and is affiliated with the Masonic Lodge and the Security Benefit Association.
On October 22, 1907, Mr. Boylan married Miss Virginia Roe, a daughter of Jasper Newton and Margaret (Shultz) Roe, of Clyde, Kansas, where Mrs. Boylan was born November 13, 1879. She was educated in the public schools of her native town. Mr. and Mrs. Boylan have a daughter, Vera Leona.
WILLIAM REECE-On the history of constructive development in the Redlands district one of the best authorities from personal observation and experience is Mr. William Reece of Crafton.
Mr. Reece was born in England, March 10, 1861. Two years later his parents, Ralph and Mary Reece, came to America and settled in Connecticut, where he grew up as a boy and acquired his schooling. His first regular employment was in a brick yard. The duties of an old time brick yard involved perhaps as strenuous labor as any occupa- tion known to man. Mr. Reece had his full share of this kind of labor, and in that and other mechanical trades and industry he put in his years until he was about twenty-seven, when he started for California. In 1888 he left the train at San Bernardino and took the stage to Redlands. He camped near the Redlands Reservoir, and at once secured a pick and shovel job with the firm of Butler & Brown, then building the reservoir. At the end of one week he left the job_and on Sunday walked to East Highland, where he began a long period of service with W. H. Glass, who was then superintending the construction of North Fork ditch. Mr. Reece did the paving work on the bottom of this ditch for one week, and then laid up the sides, and continued as a mason work- man for a year. He was then made foreman by Mr. Glass, who for years was one of the leading contractors in ditch construction in the valley. Either as a contractor or as superintendent Mr. Glass con- structed the Redlands Reservoir and all the main foothill ditches and waterways. Mr. Reece was employed as a foreman on construction in much of this work.
In July, 1893, the Bear Valley Company went into bankruptcy, with T. P. Morrison as the first receiver, who was succeeded in a short time by Grimes & Graves, who succeeded in disposing of enough of the property and the company supplies to meet the large arrearages in debt to the laborers. At this time Mr. Glass was superintendent for the Bear Valley Company. He gave Mr. Reece instructions to clean up every- thing, take down derricks in the valley, and secure all the powder and caps and return them to storage in Redlands, since it was feared that some of these explosives would be used to blow up the dam by some laborer who had not been paid. Mr. Reece was acquainted with Ames and Johnson, respectively pavmaster and bookkeeper of the concern, whose offices were in the Hubbard Block. Mr. Johnson apprised Mr. Reece as to the expected arrival of a consignment of money to pay off some of the laborers, and on going down to the office he found a long line waiting, and going into the office ahead of them, he was handed his own pay by Mr. Johnson. At that time there was not sufficient funds to meet all the labor obligations.
Prior to this experience Mr. Reece did work for Mr. Glass at Moreno. The contract called for the construction of all the pipes and flumes on
William Ruce
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the seven hundred acres then being developed by Redlands people. Fol- lowing this he was connected with the Lake View project, which also went into bankruptcy, though again he was fortunate in securing his own wages. Mr. Reece was then employed in building storm drainage ditches for the City of Redlands, following which he worked for J. S. Edwards on Plunge Creek in the project for bringing water to the high land owned by Mr. Edwards in East Highland.
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