History of San Luis Obispo County and environs, California, with biographical sketches, Part 32

Author: Morrison, Annie L. Stringfellow, 1860-; Haydon, John H., 1837-
Publication date: 1917
Publisher: Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company
Number of Pages: 1070

USA > California > San Luis Obispo County > History of San Luis Obispo County and environs, California, with biographical sketches > Part 32

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In 1881, he bought part of the Corral de Piedra Rancho at San Luis Obispo, and there he remained two years, conducting the farm in as advanced manner as his circumstances would permit. Then he sold out and went to Adelaida. and was there engaged in farming and stock-raising on the Ed. Smith place, a tract of sixteen hundred acres. Ilis next serious venture was in homesteading and pre-empting in the Eagle district, near Shandon, at the same time that his mother and brother. William F., also homesteaded and pre-empted. In the beginning they had some eight hundred acres ad- joining, and this they increased to sixteen hundred, when Mr. Shimmin and his relations divided their interests. The brother continued to farm in that vicinity, but on January 12, 1899, Marion Shimmin came to Paso Robles and for the next four years worked for George F. Bell.

He then formed a partnership with Thomas Stevens in a general mer- chandise business known as Shimmin & Stevens' Emporium, the proprietors commencing with a capital each of $2,500; and in that business he continued eleven and a half years, at 12th Street near Spring. So great was their prosperity that the business increased to over $100,000 a year, the firm at the same time, and for some years, having a branch at Shandon with a five thousand dollar stock, while the main store carried goods to the value of $35.000. When Mr. Stevens became paralyzed in June, 1914, the store was offered for sale, and in December of that year it was disposed of to the Fleisig brothers. Since that time Mr. Shimmin has given himself largely to settling up the business affairs and collecting the old accounts of the firm, as well as to managing his own business interests, lands and properties. He is, indeed. a man of affairs, having become a large stockholder and a director of the Citizens Bank of Paso Robles, as also one of the organizers and a large stockholder of the First National Bank of King City and a stockholder in the States Consolidated Oil Co. He still owns an office building on Spring street, near the corner of 12th.

In May, 1889, in the pretty town of Willits, Mr. Shimmin had married Miss Frankie Upp, a native of Little Lake Valley, a district in which her sister, Sarah, was the first white child born. She is the daughter of Phillip L'pp, who was born March 21. 1827, in York county, Pennsylvania, where he learned the carpenter's trade. He removed to St. Louis in 1849, and followed carpentering there until 1856, when he returned to his old home. On March 23, 1856, he was married at Lewistown, Mifflin county, to Susan Hawker, a native of Mercersburg, Pa., where she was born October 26, 1833; and soon after the festivities, they set out for California by way of the Nicaragua route. They traveled from New York to Greytown on the steamer "Orizaba": butt owing to the Walker filibustering expedition, the pioneers were delayed several weeks, Reaching the Pacific, they took the steamer "Sierra Nevada" te San I rancisco ; and after spending two years in the Sierra region, Mr. Upp located. me June. 1858, in Mendocino county, becoming one of the first settlers Little Fake valley, where he homesteaded. He built a house, and began Posticering in true Western fashion. He also followed contracting and build- ings m various places in California ; and as he was a good mechanic, his talent wow aufder was much sought after. As a farmer and stockman, too, he was Biores nl and accumulated a large tract of land. At their old home near Wollte Afr and Mrs. Upp lived in comfort ; and there they finally died. They Bail bond - ven children, two of whom, besides Mrs. Shimmin, are still living : Mr- hn smith. of Paso Robles, and George W. Upp, who resides at Willits.

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Mrs. Shimmin was educated under Professor King at the Conservatory of Music, of the University of the Pacific, San Jose, and her pronounced natural talent, together with her superior training, has made her one of the best- known musicians in this section. A son, Marion Francis, reflects most creditably upon his father, as a Standard Oil Co. representative here; while two other children, Cleora and Mildred Inez, are at home.

A Republican in politics and a foremost worker in the Chamber of Com- merce, Mr. Shimmin was for nine years a trustee for the schools in Paso Robles, and for seven years a school trustee in the Eagle district. He is a member of Santa Lucia Lodge, No. 250, I. O. O. F., of Paso Robles, and is a Past Chief Ranger of the Independent Order of Foresters. He also takes an active interest in religious matters, being a trustee and dean of the Con- gregational Church.

RICHARD M. SHACKELFORD .- Born in Washington county, near the town of Mackville, Ky., January 17, 1834, the late Richard M. Shackelford of Paso Robles was the son of James and Sarah (Dickerson) Shackelford. who were natives of the Blue Grass State. When he was eight years old his parents took him to Missouri ; and as he was one of a family of eleven chil- dren, it became necessary for him to make an early start to support himself. His opportunities for attending school were limited, but later in life he made up for lost time by going to night school. At the age of eighteen he started across the plains, driving an ox team ; and the journey that began March 14. 1852, ended in Sacramento on September 23, of that year.

Young Shackelford was variously employed until 1857, in which year he became identified with a milling enterprise in Marysville. He later estab- lished the Merchants' Forwarding Company; but after sustaining severe losses during the floods of 1862, he began freighting across the country to Virginia City, Nev., and while in the latter state was elected to the Assembly which convened immediately after Nevada was admitted to statehood in the Union.

In 1866 Mr. Shackelford located in Los Gatos, Cal., where he conducted a general merchandise store and a lumber yard ; and in 1869 he sold out and went to Salinas, purchased the Lorenzo ranch and farmed until 1873, when he sold and moved to Hollister, and engaged in the milling business. The mill he then owned is now one of the many belonging to the Sperry Flour Company. Since 1886, Mr. Shackelford has been identified with Paso Robles. For many years he was connected with the Southern Pacific Milling Company as manager of their warehouses, and later was president of the Salinas Valley Lumber Co.

When he first landed in California, Mr. Shackelford was a Democrat ; but he was converted by reading Horace Greeley's articles in the New York Tribune, and he cast his first presidential vote for John C. Fremont. Two weeks after he arrived in Paso Robles. he was appointed a trustee of the school, and for thirty years served continuously on the school board. 11c was a friend of education and did much to raise the standard of the schools. Mr. Shackelford was often affectionately called the "Father of Paso Robles." He was a Mason and a man of splendid character. In 1880 he was united i marriage with Miss L. McQuestin, who was born in Galena, Ill., and dico about 1900, and four children were born of that union. In 1907 he was mar ried the second time, to Mrs. Alice Eugenia Follansbee, a native of (_i

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county. Illinois, who still survives him. Mr. Shackelford passed away Jan- uary 12, 1915, and his death was a severe loss to both San Luis Obispo County and the state.

JOHN G. PRELL .- The distinction of being the oldest living American settler in the Santa Maria valley is held by John G. Prell, who now resides, retired, in Santa Maria, where he still takes an active interest in all move- ments for the betterment of the community, being a director in the Valley Savings Bank, a large landowner and, above all, a high-minded man. Of German birth and parentage, he was born in Leipsic, April 5, 1837, a son of Gottfried and Maria ( Wittenbecher ) Prell. The father owned a small tract of nineteen acres of land, was a stone mason by trade and was about forty-three years old when his son John G. was born, the youngest of four children. The grandfather, also named Gottfried, was a stone mason by trade, lived and died in Saxony, and was an only son of another Gottfried Prell, also a stone mason, who came from the Province of the Palatinate, on the west side of the Rhine.

After the death of the father, his widow, in 1854, brought her four children to America and settled on a heavily timbered farm in Indiana, near South Bend. Only one and one half acres of this tract of land was cleared, and it was there that their log house was built and the little farming opera- tions were begun.

John G. Prell went to school in Germany until he was fourteen, and was confirmed in the Evangelical Lutheran Church. After the arrival of the little family in America, the young lad had to go to work for wages, receiving seven dollars per month in winter and fourteen in summer for work done in a brickyard. He never had an opportunity to go to school after coming to this country, but he has been a student nevertheless all his life, and is a well-informed man. For many years he has been a diligent reader of the newspapers, and has always kept abreast of the times. He worked for wages until 1860, then went to Pikes Peak, Colo., at that time in Kansas, mined for gold there, and was in Golden City from April 1 to June 12, 1860. His money was nearly gone, he having but thirty-five dollars to his name; and gold at that time was uncertain. He was too proud to go back home and be counted a failure : so he determined to go West, and was fortunate in meeting two brothers named Hull, from Iowa, who were on their way to California. He asked about coming with them, and when they said that they wanted seventy-five dollars to take him through, Mr. Prell replied, "I have only thirty-five dollars." They then said, "You seem to be a good, honest boy, and you can work out the balance when you get to California"; and after barting with his thirty-five dollars, he had but ten cents in his pocket. He worked during the passage to pay for his meals, but walked all the way from Denver, except about ten miles and when he was fording the streams and offers, in order to save the horses.

Arriving in California, Mr. Prell met a man who hired him to do some Pacer mini g on shares, his share to be one third of the amount washed out. This he continued for six weeks, when he drew his share, $144. He went to the Full brothers, who had gone to the Vaca valley, in Solano county, and poid them the balance due : and then going to Santa Clara county, he worked wet a farm, plowing with a three-mule team and a walking plow all winter, for thirty dollars a month.

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John. G. Prell.

Eliza Orell

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In 1861 Mr. Prell, with a company of six men, started for Mexico to seek some cheap land; but when they got to a point opposite Yuma, Ariz .. on the Colorado river, they found that the water was very high ; and as there were no boats, these having been destroyed during war time, they could not cross the stream ; so they turned back to Los Angeles. Mr. Prell intended to return to San Jose, when he met a Frenchman who was looking for a man who could mould bricks. When he was informed by Mr. Prell that he could do the work, he was hired on the spot for five dollars per day, and went to work.

Saving the money he thus earned, after paying expenses, this energetic German-American went back to San Jose, bought a lease from a rancher and began for himself. He put in his crop; but the winter was so wet, with sixty- six inches of rain, and the mustard so thick and high, that it proved too ex- pensive to harvest, and he gave the crop, good though it was, to the owner of the land to cancel his rent, losing $200 thereby. He was then that amount worse off than nothing ; so he went to work in the brickyards again. The fol- lowing year he returned to farming and succeeded, continuing until 1866, when, in October, he sold out and, having $2.200 in gold, decided to go back to Indiana and visit his folks at South Bend. Mr. Prell, however, had had a taste of California climate, as a result of which he did not like the cold winters of the East. He also had become acquainted with his present wife, and they had arranged to get married when he should get some land of his own. So he went to southwestern Missouri, and in Jasper county bought three hundred twenty acres for six dollars an acre, a farm located about sixty miles west from Springfield.

At Raleigh, Mo., therefore, Mr. Prell was united in marriage with Miss Eliza Bower, who was born September 16, 1846, at Massillon, O., a daughter of Hugh and Mary (Shook) Bower, of Scotch and German descent. She had three brothers and two sisters ; but only herself and a brother, John J. of Michigan, are living. Mrs. Prell had come from her home in South Bend, Ind., to meet Mr. Prell, and they were married on June 8, 1867. Her grand- father, David Shook, was an officer in the War of 1812, and settled in Ohio when there were but four houses in the town of Canton. Mr. Shook was a cabinet-maker by trade, and was often called upon to make coffins in those early pioneer days, for which he received the sum of two dollars. Mrs. Prell remembers when they were made for two dollars and a half. Then under takers charged but five dollars for their services. Mrs. Prefl left her home and friends, where she was surrounded with many comforts, to join the man of her choice in the wilderness, and to her is due a great deal of credit for the part taken by them in the development of the resources of the West.

During the Civil War, Jasper county as well as other sections had been devastated by the contending armies, and houses and buildings had been burned; Mr. Prell, therefore, planted only seventy acres to grain. He was taken sick with malaria, fever and ague, and being discouraged, he sold out, determining to get back to California, his land of opportunity. Hle and his wife went to New York and took a steamer to Panama, crossed the isthmus and boarded the steamer "Golden Gate" for San Francisco, going direct on their arrival to Santa Clara county and to the same farm he had worked before. This land he leased and put in a crop in 1868. He was still looking for a location where he might settle down and get some land very cheap; so he came down into the Santa Maria valley to prospect, and finally pre-empted one

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hundred sixty acres, three miles southeast from what is now Santa Maria, made his location, went back to Santa Clara county, settled his affairs and returned to his pre-emption about November 1, 1868. He bought lumber for his house in San Luis Obispo, hauled it to his ranch with a six-horse team, mired down eight times, and had to unload three times before he finally got to his destination. He erected a house, this being the first house built in the settlement outside of Guadalupe. What was often demanded of pioneers may be judged from the fact that Mr. Prell, having one more year to go with his lease in the north, went back and put in twenty acres of barley for the 1869 crop, harvested it, and then, with his wife and baby, came to the valley in September, 1869, and moved into his house, which he had enlarged. In this section he has lived and prospered ever since.

Having saved some money, in 1882 he bought three hundred twenty acres of school land, and later added eighty acres more. In the year 1880 Mr. Prell raised over nineteen thousand centals of grain, two thirds wheat and the rest barley. He plowed and sowed the land all alone, averaging twelve acres per day. This was his first real financial success. He began leasing land and for years was a large farmer, succeeding, as the time passed, in getting together a snug fortune, so that now. in his old age, he has no worries to harass him, for he is independent.

The four children in the family are John S., a civil engineer of San Fran- cisco: Lillian, who married W. S. Cook and lives in Los Angeles with her four children, John A., Harry, Dewey D., and Dorothy ; Mrs. Blanche Vincent, a widow, who, with one son, Eric V., lives with her parents and assists her mother in keeping house; and Laura, who died aged six years.

In 1910 Mr. Prell retired from the ranch, bought a lot and erected his present fine bungalow home at the corner of Mill and Thornburg streets in Santa Maria, where he and his wife live, surrounded by every comfort. It was about this time that Mr. Prell made an extended trip back to Germany to see the country, where he found many changes since he lived there as a lad. He returned to California, more pleased than ever with the possibilities of his adopted state, for here he made his success.

Mr Prell cast his first vote at the election in Indiana when Schuyler Colfax was sent to Congress, thus having the satisfaction of seeing a man elected for whom he cast his first ballot, and who later became Vice-President when U. S. Grant was first elected. Mr. Prell joined the Odd Fellows in Indiana at this time. the degrees being conferred upon him by Mr. Colfax, and he has been a member of the order for fifty-nine years, now belonging to the Santa Maria Lodge, No. 302, which he helped to organize and of which he is a charter member. He is also a charter member of Hesperian Lodge. No. 264. 1 .. &. A. M. He has always been interested in the cause of education, and for mmy years served as a trustee of Pleasant Valley district, of which he was bit of the organizers: and he did much by his influence to raise the standard of the schools in the valley.

Mr Prell has accumulated a competence through his own efforts and by -mithy lotest dealings with everybody. He has ever had a kindly word If the h averaged and unfortunate, and has given towards all worthy causes Wir tho dit dire distress. He is as bright and alert as a man of fifty. makes anderen friends, and with his wife, who has ever been a willing assistant. com biot Look upon pioneer days in this state and truly say that they have

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done their duty, as they have seen it, and may now enjoy a well-earned leisure. surrounded by a legion of friends and well-wishers.

MARIA ZORADA KING .- To the women who have taken an active interest in the upbuilding of the various interests of the state, great credit should be given, especially to those women who, through family ties, repre- sent the native Californian, and possess that grace. and ease of manner so characteristic of the true Castilian. Among these is numbered Mrs. Maria Zorada King, a native of California, born in Santa Barbara, a daughter of Juan P. and Benina (Neito) Olivera. The former was born in Los Angeles, was the owner of the Tepesquet rancho of nine thousand acres, and died in Los Angeles, aged ninety-three years. His father, Thomas Olivera, was a native of Spain and was the first owner of the Tepesquet rancho, which he afterwards sold to Pacifico Ontiveros. He died at an advanced age.

Maria Z. Olivera, daughter of a proud Spanish family, received her edu- cation in the grammar school and in the Sisters' College at Santa Barbara. She was twice married, first in 1877, when she was wedded to Salvador Ontiveros, who was born in Los Angeles in 1842, a brother of Abraham Ontiveros, whose sketch appears elsewhere in this work. At one time he became owner of fourteen thousand acres of the Tepesquet rancho, by in- heritance from his father and by purchase from his brothers and sisters. Through the marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Ontiveros, five children were born : Sinicio L., who married, and died without children : Zorada G., wife of L. F. Hughes, of Santa Maria ; Fulgincio S., rancher on the Tepesquet ; Mona Ero- linda, wife of Jack Portenstein of Los Angeles; and Ernest L., of Santa Maria. Mr. Ontiveros died in 1891. The second marriage united Mrs. Ontiveros with Dr. Arthur Morgan King, who was born in Missouri, prac- ticed medicine and osteopathy for some years, and died in Santa Maria. January 7, 1913.

Mrs. King has been a lifelong resident of Santa Barbara county, and through her own family and by marriage with Mr. Ontiveros, represents two of the very oldest Spanish families in California. She has devoted her life to rearing her children and maintaining her home, is publie-spirited to a marked degree, and has a wide circle of friends in the county. She sold her interest in the fourteen-thousand-acre ranch and retired to a home in Santa Maria at 515 East Main street, where she dispenses that gracious hospitality so char- acteristic of the Spanish people.

LEVI EXLINE .- Not every man is so happy in the selection of his life-motto as Levi Exline, the upright, honest and reliable farmer and horti- culturist, and oldest settler of Oak Flat, whose motto is, "Do right, and it will be right." Born in Coshocton county, not far from Zanesville, O., on January 15, 1844, he was the son of Adam Exline, a native of Pennsylvania. born in the year 1793, and a member of an old Virginia family that removed to Pennsylvania, and then to Indiana in 1845. Adam Exline settled in a new and wild country near where Bloomfield. Greene county, Indiana, later was founded. There he took up heavy timber land and became a wagon maker, running a wagon and carriage shop ; and in good. old-fashioned style he cut his material from the hickory forest on his place and so successfully seasoned the timber that his wagons seemed as if they never would wear out Yet he remained a poor man and died in modest circumstances, in 1802 Levi's mother was Miss Christene Saucerman, of Pennsylvania Gernin

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parentage : she died in 1878. She had nine children, but only two are living, and Levi Exline is the only one in California; a brother, William, lives in Texas. The oldest brother, George A. Exline, served in the 85th Indiana Regiment during the Civil War. He was taken prisoner, and was confined m Libby Prison. He died at the old Hoosier home in Greene county, in December, 1916.

Levi was reared on the Indiana farm, from which in winters he attended the local school with its log house, slab benches, and similar crude furnish- ings, or lack of them. He was handy with tools, his father having a good set of the necessary implements, and got such a helpful start in life that in August, 1868, he left New York for California, then, as now, regarded by so many Easterners as the Land of Promise. From New York he took the boat to Aspinwall, and from there crossed the Isthmus by rail, proceeding north along the coast on the steamship "Golden Age" and arriving in San Francisco in September, 1808, at the end of a twenty-five days' trip. He next went to Sacramento and then to Eldorado county, where he remained two months; and from there he journeyed to Paso Robles Hot Springs. After a year he returned to Eldorado county, and spent the summer in mining; but having a brother at Paso Robles, he came back in 1875 and pitched his tent along the Salinas river.

Two years later he located on his present homestead, where he devel- oped water ; in Gallinas ( Chicken) creek there seemed to be a sort of clay that kept the water from coming to the surface. When he located in this place it was railroad land ; but as the railroad had not done its part in the development of the country, the land went back to the government. He was therefore eight years proving up on his place three miles west from Paso Robles, at Oak Flat. He made improvements on the one-hundred-sixty-acre claim, and then he purchased another one hundred sixty acres. He cleared the land and plowed it, raised hay and set out fruit, and now he has an orchard thirty- five years oldl, still bearing. He has had gardens, and has been a leader in raising vegetables and fruit, for his place is well adapted for apples, pears, peaches and figs, and so well adapted that he has produced excellent fruit without irrigation. The. fig trees he once set out have grown to enormous size, and now make a complete bower in front of his residence. The grape vines, also, have grown to almost fabulous size, and he is now setting out Bartlett pears and an almond orchard of forty acres.

In August. 1878, Levi Exline was married to Miss Emma Stone, who was born at Lake Geneva, in Wisconsin. the daughter of Samuel and Addie Marshall) Stone, natives of Long Island and Connecticut respectively, who Had moved west. The father was a moulder by trade. Mrs. Exline attended school at Visalia, and taught school, from fifteen until her marriage. Well- Posted on soil and climate, as well as on values, she started in the real estate Im iness: and with her son-in-law, Mr. Woolman, she organized the Paso Bible- Realty Co. Both partners are conservative and conscientious, buying, wGbhy ding and selling lands, and doing an insurance business. They pur- Wwwd. for example, a three-thousand-acre ranch in Monterey, and they have 050, Ddle from the home place, a two-hundred-acre ranch at Paso Robles. Besides, they have made some good real estate deals. In 1913, alone, Mrs. Dodaje - ld lands to the value of $180,000. Four children bless this excellent wordt Verne, a farmer on land adjoining the old home; Clyde, now Mrs.

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History of San Luis Obispo County and environs, California, with biographical sketches, Part 32

Author: Morrison, Annie L. Stringfellow, 1860-; Haydon, John H., 1837- Publication date: 1917 Publisher: Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company Number of Pages: 1070

Author: Morrison, Annie L. Stringfellow, 1860-; Haydon, John H., 1837-
Publication date: 1917
Publisher: Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company
Number of Pages: 1070