History of San Luis Obispo County and environs, California, with biographical sketches, Part 89

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 89

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In San Luis Obispo of many festival memories, Hans I. Jespersen was Woensel on April 21. 1886, to Lizzie K. Stone, a daughter of Leonard and Miwy (Fredericks) Stone, born in Maine and Germany respectively. The Tati: colne to California about 1849, while the mother reached here in 1865. They Towanie farmers in San Luis Obispo County as early as 1875. Her

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mother was a well-known nurse, and followed that profession until she re- tired. She died at the age of eighty-one. The father passed away when he was fifty-seven. They had five children : Eva Botella, now Mrs. Laurence Hansen, who conducts a dairy near San Luis Obispo; Irma L., who has be- come the wife of Harry Pond, the under-sheriff at the county seat ; Elva Stone, who is Mrs. Gustav W. Fast; Rena, who is at the San Luis Obispo high school ; and Allen, who is with his father.

Mr. Jespersen is a Democrat. He served for two years as clerk of the board of trustees of the Phillips school district, and is now clerk of the board of the Cholame district. He is a member of the Sulphur Springs Camp of the Woodmen of the World, at Paso Robles, and is also a member of the Dania Society No. 16, in San Luis Obispo.

JAMES J. MAHONEY .- The title of pioneer was justly merited by J. J. Mahoney, for in boyhood he came to this county with his father in 1868, when this section was but sparsely settled, and later became identified with its bust- ness and farming interests. James J. Mahoney was born near Whiskey Town, Shasta county, May 10, 1863, a son of James Mahoney, who was born and raised in Boston, and was clerking in a store there when the gold fever seized him. He came to California via Panama in 1850, and mined in the vicinity of Shasta county, where he was reasonably successful.

In 1867, he engaged in the hotel business in Whiskey Town, and in 1868 went to San Francisco; and soon afterward came to San Luis Obispo looking for a location. In the spring he pre-empted land, and having returned for his family, he settled on the place. There were no improvements of any kind, and he went to work with a will and made a fine home ranch, built his house, fenced, broke the ground and engaged in raising stock, cattle and sheep, using the brand JM, which was later used also by his son. He raised grain and had a dairy of thirty cows, panning and skimming the milk, and churning by hand, and sold the butter at the ranch for one dollar a roll. Ile was the first to make butter in this section. He bought more land and at the time of his death had a large acreage.

Ile built the first school house here ; it was made of adobe brought from the mission, and was the only one between Salinas and San Luis Obispo, and he was trustee for years. He married Hannah Wade in Boston, in No vember, 1847, and they celebrated their golden wedding anniversary in 1897. He died in 1903, aged eighty-four, and his wife died in 1908, also aged eighty- four. They had five children, three growing to maturity Mrs. Mary Murray, of Marin county ; D. F., recorder of San Luis Obispo County, and James J.

James J. Mahoney was raised in this county, attending the public school held in the old adobe and working on his father's ranch, which he helped to clear and improve. In 1907, he went to Nevada and at Battle Mountain bought a mine which he began developing. He put in six years there, and in- corporated the Pittsburg Red Top Mining Co , of which he was manager. Ile also developed and managed the Pittsburg Gold Hill Mining Co. In 1912 he returned to the home ranch and thereafter operated it with good success until his death in July, 1917. In politics Mr. Mahoney was an Independent Progres- sive. He was a charter member of San Miguel Parfor No. 150, Native Sons of the Golden West, of which he was a past president. His property included 3,300 acres in one body, fenced and improved ; and here the family are raising Durham cattle, grain, and hay. 41

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ALBERT MENG .- An honest, straightforward, enterprising and suc- iessful man, who has risen by indomitable energy from modest circumstances a comfortable affluence and who, therefore, is a credit to himself and to the community in which he resides, is Albert Meng, the well known and popular train and stock farmer in the Cholame valley. Born in Cincinnati, O., in 18 6, he was the son of Sebastian Meng, a native of Kuhr, Graubunden, Switzerland. Traditional history, as handed down from one generation to another, tells us that the Meng family goes back to England, where there were five brothers of that name who came to Switzerland as English knights. during a religious war, and fought for the Swiss Republic. Three of the knights were slain in battle, but two survived and settled in the country, mnd so became the ancestors of the now celebrated Swiss Meng family. Albert's father was a carpenter by trade, but he also followed farming. He was married there to Miss Anne Wilhelm, a native of that section. Together they came to the United States and settled in Ohio, after which they re- moved to Kansas City, Mo. Ten years later they went to Baxter Springs, Kan., and then to the Indian Territory, where Sebastian Meng continued farming. In the fall of 1886 he brought his family to California, and located in San Luis Obispo County. The elder Meng had already made a trip to San Francisco as early as 1871, working at the carpenter's trade there for two years, after which he returned East; and finding that railroad lands had reverted to the government, he determined to come here again and seek a homestead.

lle first pre-empted a hundred sixty acres, which his son Albert now owns and which includes the present site of his residence, and afterwards home- steaded land adjoining and across the road, so that he had three hundred twenty acres in all. Ile hauled lumber from San Luis Obispo for his house. and built a comfortable and attractive home there. The next year he began breaking the ground with a two-horse team, and he followed general farm- mg until his death in 1903, at the age of eighty-two. His wife had died two years previously, eighty-three years old.

Of the six children who grew to maturity, four are living, and Albert is the youngest, and the only son. When he was two years old. his parents removed from Ohio to Kansas City, and in due time he was attending the schools there. continuing his schooling in Baxter Springs. lle, too, began farming as a lad in Kansas and in the Indian Territory : and on the removal of the family to Cholame, he was able to make himself more than use- Il on a ranch. When of age he pre-empted ninety acres, and later he inred a homestead of a hundred sixty acres convenient to his father's place. NA enon as he could do so. he began raising grain, cattle and horses, and in o00 1-mess he has made a real success.

starting for a specialty in Durham cattle and English shire horses, Alien Kong's brand- an M with a quarter circle above it -has been recog- 0 0 . vibol of merit. For some years, too, he raised mules, but he is Trente. for the most part. English shire horses. Success having Or sell in on all sides, he bought his father's place, and has added to the cos (canto ne gos owijs two thousand two hundred acres. This is all well pomoc0 1 0 .il Thely located in Cholame valley, three miles above the Cho- About five hundred acres of this ranch is plowed land. datos be Gag fly rises about three hundred acres of grain a year. When

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the combined harvester appeared and proved itself a success, Albert Meng, in partnership with a neighbor, bought one, and managed the same for many years. Now, however, although he uses two big teams on the ranch, he hires the harvester out.

In December, 1906, Mr. Meng was married at San Luis Obispo to Mrs. Julia (Railing) Truesdale, a native of Lima, O., and a daughter of Isaac Railing, who saw honorable service in the Civil War as a member of an Ohio regiment. Her mother had been Miss Susan Cochrane. She was first married in Ohio to Mr. Truesdale, and in 1875 they came to Ventura county and afterward to Los Angeles. In 1892, they removed to Shandon and there she became a widow. By her first marriage she had five children : John A .. who died in San Luis Obispo; Daisy D., now Mrs. Tinnin, of Newman : William Elmer, who resides in Sacramento; James Alfred, who is in Shan- don, and Lulu, who has become Mrs. Perry McDowell, of Gustine, Merced county.

Albert Meng, always willing to serve his fellow-citizens, was for six years trustee of the Cholame school district. He is a Democrat and conspicuous in the councils of his party.

DOUGLAS A. TUCKER .- It would be difficult to find a man more emphatically in accord with the true western spirit of progress, or more keenly alive to the opportunities awaiting the industrious and intelligent man of affairs in the section about San Miguel than in Douglas A. Tucker, who has built up a successful stock business and identified himself with the best undertakings in his district. He was born near Booneville, Cooper county, Mo., May 8, 1847, a son of Douglas A. Tucker. a native of Virginia who was orphaned at an early age. He went to Missouri a young man, farmed and there married Maria Bronaugh, a Virginian.

In 1849, he left home with a team of oxen and started across the plains to make his fortune in the mines of California, made a successful "strike" here, and returned to his home, intending to bring his family back to this state ; but his wife refused to leave her home and he settled down to farm- ing there. In 1858 he entered government land in Henry county, paying one dollar and twenty-five cents per acre. It was located seventeen miles from Clinton, and here he developed a valuable farm. When the War broke ont he was in the path of the conflict, and he lost his crops and stock and was "broke"; but going back to Cooper county, he tried to retrieve his fortunes. He never got on his feet again, however, and died there at the age of eighty- eight years, his wife also dying there. They had six children, five of whom are now living.

The fourth child in the family, Douglas \., Jr., was reared in Henry and Cooper counties, Missouri, and attended the common schools there until he was a young man, when he was married to Mollie J. White, a native of Missouri, whose parents had come from Virginia to that state and settled in an early day. Our subject farmed in Cooper and adjoining counties in Missouri until 1888, when he decided he would try his luck in California . so he left his eastern home and brought his wife and children here, stopping the first year in Riverside.

He then came to San Luis Obispo County and located a homestead in 1889. Ile built a small house, and worked out for wages in order to make a living while he was improving the ranch. He did anything that came his

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Was, mujunger how long the hours were or how hard the work, or how low The wage, recen ig only one dollar a day for plowing with an eight- or ten- umde team. In ine he had his place so he could use it for a stock ranch, wwwi gradually he improved it and now has one hundred seventy acres under topes. He mi- hogs of the Poland-China breed, and cattle, and his brand, the letter T, is well known. His range was dotted with mountain springs Wienshing water for his stock, and he usually turned out two droves of hogs a year.

In 1914, in October, Mr. Tucker rented his ranch and located in San Miguel on account of his wife's health, bought the fine residence on the m-i where he now lives, and built large barns for his stock. lle and his En Ernest lease a ranch of nine hundred acres eight miles from town. They bye a ten-mule and a ten-horse team for their ranch work. In addition Mr. Tucker does teaming and hauling. Ile has worked behind horses since he was eight years of age, and can handle anything that he can draw the lines over.

Mr. Tucker considers California his best friend, for here he has made his success in life and gained a competence for his family. He has always been mnich interested in school work and served as trustee for many years. In politics he is a Democrat, but has never sought office. Mr. and Mrs. Tucker are the parents of five children: Ilattie, Mrs. Jacob Doty, resides in San Miguel: Mildred, Mrs. Ernest Bergeman, is at San Miguel; Florence, Mrs. Scow, died in 1904; Ernest farms with his father; and Everet died in early childhood.

WILLIAM ELLIS .- William Ellis was born in King township, York county, Ontario, Canada, March 15, 1843, the son of Henry and Syrena ( Hambley ) Ellis, natives of England and Nova Scotia respectively. They were farmers in Wellington county, Ontario, and had a family of six children as follows: Mary Ann, who died in Ontario; James, who resides near Pacific Grove: William, the subject of this review; Ellen and Enoch C., who died in Ontario: and Mrs. Lydia Patterson, who resides in Oregon.

William Illis spent his early years working on his father's farm and attending the public schools in his vicinity. In 1863 his father died, and William then assisted his mother on the farm until he reached his majority, after which he farmed for himself until 1886. He then decided to remove to Calfornia, and in April. 1886, located a pre-emption of one hundred sixty acres, his present home in Hog canen, or Pleasant Valley, Monterey county. He broke the first furrow, and improved the place with residence and build- mi-, later adding a quarter section to it. Here he is raising grain and stock, and has met with good success.

On March 11, 1884, Mr. Ellis was married in Ontario to Miss Sarah Ann However, who was born near Toronto, But was reared in Wellington COMO , Ontario the daughter of James and Jane ( Mathews) lonsinger. To SosemDE Mrs. Fllis three children have been born. Ruby May, now Mrs. Dawird re-iles near Morgan Hill; Wilbert J. is assisting his father on the ctm amit Bella. J. also resides at home. The family are members of the 11 | x bor 1 it | strella.

Olie bas made three trips back to Ontario. The last trip was taken m1 0009 Mier visiting Ontario, the family, on their return to California, AtAus sah hed than ever with their adopted home.

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THOMAS P. GORHAM .- Among the successful business men of San Miguel who have contributed both to the building up and the beautifying of this attractive town, is Thomas P. Gorham, who was born in Atlanta. Ill., on June 13, 1863, and came to California in 1885, settling the next year at San Miguel. Thomas' great-grandfather, Hezekiah, a New England farmer, traced his ancestors back to the celebrated Mayflower, his folks drifting afterward into Vermont at the time of its early settlement. Ilis grandfather, David Gorham, married Rachael Stiles, also of an old New England family, and in 1850 came to Racine, Wis., the couple eventu fly spending their last days in Nebraska. Mr. Gorham's great-uncle, George C. Gorham, was candidate for Governor of California and ran against Governor Haight, the Democratic nominee. Thomas' father was A. F. Gorham, a Vermonter born in Rutland. He settled in Wisconsin and then in Chicago. where he became a dealer in coal, prospering until he was burned out by the great fire. Following this catastrophe, he took up a homestead and went to farming in Harlan county, Neb. ; but new disaster in the form of drought and grasshoppers beset him. The year 1885 found him in Pomona, California, and in 1886 he came to San Miguel, where for a while he engaged in the furni- ture business.

After a life of unusual activity .\. F. Gorham, retired, still resides here, at the age of eighty. His wife, nee Helen E. King, who was born at Joliet, Ill., and whose grandfather had a well-known sash and door manufactory, died in 1896. Three children were born of their union: A. M. Gorham, who resides in Stockton ; R. E. Gorham, who lives at Monterey, and Thomas, the subject of our sketch. The latter was brought up on farms in Illinois and Nebraska, attending there the public schools, and was early employed in the furniture business, into which his father had ventured. Next he learned the carpenter's trade, and when he removed to San Miguel he followed that occu- pation, soon becoming a contractor and builder. For years he was the prin- cipal contractor of this place, putting up residences, business houses, schools, and churches, both frame and brick ; and in this field his ability was acknowl- edged. In 1908, however, he quit this field to devote all his time to mercan- tile business. Five years before he had bought out his brother's interest, and he is now engaged in general merchandising under the firm name of Gor- ham & Sonnenberg.

In 1892, Mr. Gorham bought the water works of San Miguel; and during the past twenty-four years he has introduced such improvements, and so added to the equipment, that the plant, with its reservoir on the hill cemented, and having a capacity of 163,000 gallons -its steam pumps and electric motors, all distributing water with a thirty five pound pressure, may well be considered equal to any in a town of similar size in the State. Rather naturally, Mr. Gorham has served for many years as chief of the fire department, which has a chemical cart, a hook-and-ladder truck, and some 450 feet of hose. This enterprising man has also engaged, as owner, in the real estate business, building and selling the houses he has constructed. Among others he owns several business buildings, as well as his fine resi dence and garage, the latter with cement floors ; and all of these he built.

Mrs. Gorham, who was married at San Miguel, was known in childhood as Elizabeth Sonnenberg, the daughter of George Sonnenberg, a poultry dealer of Mountain View, Santa Clara county, where she was raised. Mr.

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and Mrs. Gorham have four children Helen E .. now Mrs. Ramsey, of San Miguel: Edna B., who is one of the clever young ladies in the class of '17 at the Paso Robles high school : Lucile and Thomas Albert. Mr. Gorham is a Republican and he belongs to the Woodmen of the World. Mrs. Gorham has served as school trustee, is past president of San Miguel Parlor No. 94, N. D. G. W., and is district deputy for this county. Both belong to the Fraternal Brotherhood.

WILLIAM HENRY KITCHEN .- It may be that neither William Henry Kitchen nor his worthy wife have much time nowadays to talk about the remote past, engrossed as they are in the still more absorbing affairs of a progressive present, such as they themselves have helped to bring about : but if Mr. Kitchen can be persuaded to chat about the days long gone, he will tell many a good story in which Oak Flat and Dry Creek figure, and none perhaps more likely to stir your imagination than the tale of how the Daltons started on their mad career of bloody crime after they had been for some years his peaceful and apparently decent and amiable neighbors and fellow citizens.

Born at Castroville, Monterey county, February 3, 1866, he grew up under the ruder conditions of a civilization that was in the making, and varh learned to hustle for himself. His father was George Kitchen, a native of Arkansas, who crossed the plains to California when the buffalo and the Indian disputed his right of passage and when a man had to toe the chalk-line mighty carefully after his arrival in the land of gold not to rin up against some of the precepts of the gold digger, a violation of which usually cost the offender his life. After mining awhile for gold, George Kitchen settled in Mendocino county, and near Ukiah he was married to Matilda Eubank, whose father had crossed the plains with ox-teams and become a pioneer of that county. George Kitchen engaged in the lumber- ng and logging business at Mendocino ( ity, and it was there that his wife died when her son, William H., was but five years old. Mr. Kitchen went from Mendocino county to Castroville, where he engaged in raising stock until 1879, when he moved to San Luis Obispo County and spent a year on the Estrella ranch. He next spent three years near Arroyo Grande and Then came to Dry creek, where he homesteaded one hundred sixty acres woven miles from what is now Paso Robles; and in due time he added an- other quarter section to his holdings. He died at Gonzales.

There were three other children in the family of George Kitchen : Nellie, whe married Foote Rhyne of San Jose: Annie, now Mrs. Houghton of San Miguel: and George, who is with his brother, William H.

William Henry Kitchen was educated in the public schools of his day amikor bewy hood began to work as a driver of a team; and as he grew aller le drive a header wagon on land that is now a part of Paso Robles. Wormer visiting the James family and a comparatively young man with fore pirwenig address seemed to enjoy spending considerable of his time Mr. Kitchen on the header wagon. Weeks afterwards he lowcostban the affable young man was none other than Frank James, who ar Dating there incog. When William Kitchen was of age, he located Damme ud af a hundred sixty acres, and pre empted a like number of an men las siter's place on Dry creek about seven miles from Paso 120 Bir mileer years he raised stock and grain on this ranch ; but in

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1902 he sold it and moved into Paso Robles, and soon started the Fashion Stables on Park street. In 1909 he sold out to W. Il. Evans to engage in other business. After Mr. Evans sold the stables, he became a partner with Mr. Kitchen in a cigar store. They are also engaged in farming on the Huer-Huero river, owning a ranch four miles east of Paso Robles. With his sons, Arthur and Roy, Mr. Kitchen owns sixty acres on the Iluer-Iluero, where he has installed a pumping plant and is raising alfalfa and doing a good dairy business.

On November 1, 1887, Mr. Kitchen was united in marriage, at San Luis Obispo, with Miss Gertrude Jones, who was born at Buffalo, N. Y., the daughter of Watson and Marian ( Halifax) Jones, natives of New York state and of England, respectively. The mother died when Mrs. Kitchen was a baby, and she was reared by an aunt, Mrs. Ellen Jones, and came with her to California in 1882, and in March, 1884, to San Luis Obispo County. She was the youngest of five children and is the only one resid- ing in this state. Four children have blessed the union of Mr. and Mrs. Kitchen: Elmer, who conducts a pool hall at Santa Barbara; Otto, who runs a like establishment at Ventura; Arthur, who is also in that same business at Paso Robles, and Roy, a barber in the latter city. The fine home occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Kitchen was erected by them at Pine and Sixteenth streets. He is a Democrat in politics and in fraternal con- nections is a Forester.

ED. HOLZINGER .- An enterprising and progressive citizen who is making a success of more than one undertaking, and yet finds time within the round of twenty-four hours to advance educational work and so advance the interests of the youth of his community, Ed. Holzinger is a man of affairs at Creston, where he is engaged in general merchandising. Hle is a son of Mar- tin Holzinger, a sketch of whose life is given elsewhere in these pages. Born near Rock Island, Henry county, Ill., May 29, 1875, the oldest of four chil- dren, he came with his parents to California in 1884, having thus spent the first nine years of his boyhood in the Prairie State. After coming to Cali- fornia, he attended the public schools at Geneseo and Creston, and then went to Ramsey's Business College at Stockton, where he was graduated in 1896. After clerking six months in a store, he returned to his father's farm, and he and his father and a brother, Albert, engaged together in agriculture. They made the old home their headquarters until their father died, operating some eight hundred acres and employing two or three large teams.

After his father's death, he began farming for himself, leasing a ranch of some eight hundred acres, half of which he sowed to wheat and barley each year. To till the soil and handle the crops, he used a couple of large teams, and he also became interested in a combined harvester that not only met their own requirements, but served some of their neighboring ranchers as well. More than this, he has raised draft horses. He has experienced such good results that he has continued farming ever since, and still operates the same place, superintending it and committing to others the responsibility of details.

In November, 1915, he entered the mercantile field, buying out F. G. Gilson & Co., at Creston, and becoming proprietor of the general merchandise store there. Besides a varied stock of general merchandise, including hard- ware, hay and grain, he had the post office located in his store, and was made

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AS THEint postufaster. For some years he owned a hundred ten acres adjoin- H. tripi inn lately he has disposed of this land.

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History of San Luis Obispo County and environs, California, with biographical sketches, Part 89

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