History of Santa Clara County California with biographical sketches, Part 61

Author: Sawyer, Eugene T
Publication date: 1922
Publisher: Los Angeles : Historic Record Co.
Number of Pages: 1934

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In national political affairs a Republican, and in respect to creed and church membership an Episco- palian, Mr. Brown and his wife are broad-minded citizens, delighted when participating in church work under any acceptable banner. Mr. Brown's life is guided by the Golden Rule of doing unto others as he would be done by. He is one of the most liberal and enterprising men in Santa Clara County, and there is no worthy movement that has for its aim the betterment of the conditions and the enhancing of the happiness of the people of his community that does not receive his hearty support. He is well known as a very liberal contributor to civic organi- zations and the Red Cross, as well as other humani- tarian societies. It is to men of the type of George Brown that California owes much of its present development, for he was not afraid to venture and work to develop the raw land until the orchards of the valley have become a world-famous garden spot. Mr. Brown is well read and well informed, and having a retentive memory and being a good narrator of events, is an interesting conversationalist. He has a comfortable home, and being a big-hearted man, he loves to dispense the old-time California hospitality, so that it is indeed a pleasure to enjoy a visit with this pleasant old pioneer.

MRS. MARY HAYES-CHYNOWETH .- The in- terest awakened by a visit to the beautiful estate of Edenvale, with its sixty acres of well-kept grounds is heightened by a knowledge of the wonderful per- sonality who once lived and reigned there, Mrs. Mary Hayes-Chynoweth, who, until the time she passed away, continued with undiminished enthu- siasm and power the remarkable manifestations of spiritual life evidenced even in the years of her childhood. The deep religious fervor that was one of her predominant characteristics came as an in- heritance from her father, Rev. Abraham Folsom, who was a minister of the Free Will Baptist faith. Sup- plementing this inheritance there early came into her aspiring soul a power which she accepted as a gift from God and which shaped the course of her use- ful existence, and resulted in her efficient service as pastor of the True Life Church of San Jose.

In the early day Rev. Abraham Folsom left Ver- mont, where he was born and where his parents, Daniel and Mary ( Moody) Folsom had lived and labored. With a pioneer instinct and an earnest desire to preach the Gospel in regions then just

opened to the civilizing influences of American set- tlement, he settled in Holland, Erie County, N. Y .. and there his daughter, Mary, was born October 2, 1825. Later he moved to Cuba, same state, and finally, when his daughter was twenty-three years of age, he identified himself with the then sparsely settled state of Wisconsin. While still a mere child the daughter had given evidence of the possession of peculiar qualities. When she was five, two years after the family had settled in Cuba, her little sister was accidently and seriously burned on the head. Her frantic cries were continued in spite of every effort to relieve her. About 1:30 in the morning the older sister was awakened, dressed and came into the room where the little sufferer lay in extreme pain. As she took the child into her arms, her cries stopped and soon she was sleeping comfortably. As she grew older neighbors began to come to her for help in cases of sickness. Many a page might be filled with accounts of her successful labors in relieving the sick. One instance of the kind, oc- curring when she was ten, may be mentioned among the many of a similar nature. A neighbor hurried to their home one day, saying that he feared his wife was dead. Hastening to their home, the child found the woman with jaws set, apparently in the embrace of death. After rubbing the body for a time she asked for angelica, with which she made a tea. The 'absence of a tooth in the woman's mouth enabled her to force a small amount of the tea into the throat. In a very short time the sufferer returned to consciousness and to health. The cure was re- markable when it is considered that the child knew nothing of medicine nor the effects of angelica. The idea had come to her as an inspiration and the physician on his arrival praised her timely action, adding that the lady would have been dead had it not been for her help.

The environments of pioneer life and the limited means of the family prevented Miss Folsom from attending school. Her entire schooling did not cover a period of one year. Notwithstanding this privation, by research and reading she acquired such a thor- ough education that her labors as a teacher were successful to a gratifying degree. When only twelve years of age, feeling that she should not be a burden to her father, she desired to support herself by go- ing out to work, but her father persuaded her that she was too small for self-support. A few weeks later she was called to the home of Mrs. Webster, a neighbor, who was ill with inflammatory rheuma- tism. The remedies she suggested were so prompt in action that the woman was able to take up her weaving within two days. In this home she re- mained for a year as an assistant and afterward she made her own way in the world. When in her eighteenth year she took up a summer school that her brother, William A. Folsom, had taught the previous winter and her success in the work led her to follow the profession for seven years. After settling with her parents in Waterloo, Wis., she en- gaged in teaching there. During the last two years of her work as an instructor her leisure hours were largely devoted to prayer. Six months before the close of her last term the Fox sisters had begun their promulgation of spiritism. In alarm lest relatives or friends might be led into their doctrines, she prayed even more earnestly than before, asking God

Mary Hayes Chynowett

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HISTORY OF SANTA CLARA COUNTY

to show her the truth and to reveal to her the im- mortality of the soul. The answer to her petition was long delayed, but still she continued in prayer, determining that naught but death should seal her lips until God revealed to her the evidence she de- sired. With the close of her school on Friday, she returned home. The following Sunday morning serv- ices were held in the church near by and she pre- vailed on the other members of the family to attend while she remained at home with her father. The homely task of dishwashing was engaging her at- tention when she fell to the floor, crushed by what seemed to her a hundred-pound weight At the same time she began to pray in an unknown tongue, as impelled by the power of God. Her father questioned this unseen power through his daughter and was there told of the work before her for which she was to prepare herself and in doing so do the will of God. By a careful study of the miracles related in the Bible and comparing with her work, all became convinced that the divine spirit had blessed her in answer to her prayers. For two years she was under the divine influence, praying unceasingly and deprived herself at the request of the controlling pow- er of all substantial food except bread. With the in- dwelling of the holy spirit there came wonderful power in healing the sick and alleviating pain. From the regions round about came the sick and suffer- ing in such numbers that she had not time for all. Calls came to her from Whitewater, East Troy, Waukesha and other Wisconsin towns, where she was invited to preach in churches and schoolhouses. Contrary to her wishes in the matter of remuneration she was finally prevailed upon to accept all gifts voluntarily offered, as by doing so it would confer a benefit upon those whom she helped. The money thus received and her salary as a teacher were given toward paying the interest on the mortgage on her father's farm. Indeed, in all the years of the con- tinuance of the family circle, she contributed to its maintenance, proving herself a devoted daughter.

At the age of twenty-eight years Miss Folsom be- came the wife of A. E. Hayes. In addition to tak- ing charge of their home at Waterloo, Wis., and rearing their three children, E. A., Jay O., and May Hayes, she preached as the spirit guided her. Often a large number of people would come to her home for religious instruction, and invariably she ministered to their bodily needs as well as their spiritual neces- sities. About 1872 she made her first visit to Cali- fornia. After the death of Mr. Hayes, she accom- panied her sons to Santa Clara County and pur- chased the place that is now beautiful "Edenvale," situated on the Monterey Road, about seven miles south of San Jose. From the beginning of her resi- dence at Edenvale thousands visited her to seek coun- sel and throughout her remaining days she continued her ministrations to body and soul. Her second hus- band, T. B. Chynoweth, an attorney of San Jose, died about one year after their marriage, and from that time to the day of her death, her life was given wholly to religious labors. Her sons have become prominent men in the Santa Clara Valley and as owners of the San Jose Mercury and Herald wield a large influence in the permanent upbuilding of this portion of the state. The family have become weal- thy, prosperous and honored, and much of their riches has been devoted to spreading the primitive

Gospel before the world. This wealth came direct to Mary Hayes-Chynoweth as a reward for her un- selfish Christian labors. Her life record has no dup- licate in America, and notwithstanding her great wealth, she lived humbly and was constantly doing good among the people who knew and appreciated her example and noble work.

The True Life Church, founded in 1903, has in its membership an earnest body of cultured people. The ceremony of organization, November 22, was simple, yet exceedingly impressive, and brought to the thoughts of the onlookers memories of the New Testament narrative of the founding of the early Christian Church. The declaration of principles was read and subscribed to, after which a board of trus- tees were elected to serve one year and the articles of organization were adopted. On the day of the founding of the church, Mr. E. A. Hayes read the statement of brief, previously signed by those who proposed the organization of the movement. It read as follows:

"We, the undersigned, for mutual help in spiritual development and in order to more effectually spread the knowledge of the truth, hereby associate our- selves together as the True Life Church of San Jose, Cal., and declare the cardinal principles of our re- ligious belief to be as follows:

I. "We hold that religion consists in pure and holy living and unselfish doing, and not in professions.

II. "We believe in God, the Creator and Ruler of the universe, and in Him only as the author of salvation for every human being, through developing Himself in each soul to the fullness of the Christ life as shown forth in the New Testament. We believe that it is the destiny of every human soul, when he so wills and labors with sufficient diligence to that end, to develop to the same purity and spiritual power as Christ is represented in the Bible to have reached.

III.

"In order to reach that end a constant dual ef- fort by each individual is a necessity.

"First: Each one must pray unto God for an in- crease of His Life and power within him, and must desire as the chief of all valuable possessions to have incorporated in life and character all that is pure and holy in thought, word and deed.

"Second: Each must resist with all his will the promptings of his lower nature, and overcome as rapidly as he can the temptations to evil.

IV.

"We are convinced that the Christ standard of per- fection in human life is possible for each one of us and that spiritual light and wisdom come as results of growth and the overcoming of the physical ele- ments in each nature, because of the manifestations of God's life and power which have been brought to the world through Mrs. Hayes-Chynoweth. Among other things she has healed the sick by the lay- ing on of hands when no human agency could al- leviate their sufferings; she has preached the Gos- pel without previous study, but as the truth was given her through inspiration at the time; she reads the human heart as an open book, and knows its yearnings and needs which God helps her satisfy and supply; she has had revealed to her the where- abouts of the wealth hidden in the earth, as well

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as many of the mysteries of the spiritual world. God is no respector of persons and what He has done for Mrs. Hayes-Chynoweth He will do for all of His children who work for the spiritual life with the same zeal and singleness of purpose with which she has worked.

"We each pledge ourselves to do all in our power to overcome the physical elements in our natures and to grow from day to day in purity and godliness: to do everything we can to add to the interest of the meetings of this organization, and to induce as many others as possible to attend them in order that they may be benefited with ourselves."

Since its organization the True Life Church has grown in numbers, in zeal and effective service, and through the publication called "The True Life," has become a well-known factor in religious circles. With the deepest friendship toward all denominations and all sects striving to upbuild the world spiritually. Mrs. Hayes-Chynoweth endeavored, with all the pow- er of her forceful, prayerful life, to lead people to return to the doctrines of the Scriptures as preached by the Apostles. Up to the time of her death, she retained her activity, mentally and physically, and continued her self-sacrificing efforts in helping the poor and needy.

Mary Hayes-Chynoweth passed from this earthly sphere on July 27, 1905, beloved by all who knew her and mourned by her family and a large circle of friends. The following tribute paid by Dr. Eli Mc- Clish, president of the University of the Pacific, tells in simple words of her noble and self-sacrificing work and the high esteem in which she was held: "Today we come to stand by the side of the casket containing the remains of our neighbor, our friend, and the friend of humanity. For eighty years she has walked, from her humble parsonage hom through the paths of Wisconsin, out by the Great Lakes, across the plains to California, about the high- ways and byways of this county, and particularly about the beautiful home at Edenvale, everywhere scattering words of kindness, ministering in tender grace by sympathetic and healing touch to rich and poor, man or woman of any race, that she might help; and now, more eloquent than any words that can be uttered is this silent tribute of your presence, are those unbidden tears on your cheek, and the hushed lips that have so often moved in the utter- ance of truth. And what shall we say? How does it come that the largest church in the community is packed to its doors at this presence? I answer. because of what she was. In the first place, she was preeminently a religious woman. Not a graduate of a school, not a philosopher in the so-called sense of philosophy, not a philanthropist in the sense of having her name numbered as the founder of col- leges or planter of eleemosynary asylums for the needy, but as a devoted religions woman. Her re- ligion was not ecclesiastical, but was an expression of spiritual reality; faith in the unseen, which ren- dered her faithful. Her only recognition of a faith that was worth anything was a faith that makes one faithful. She was not careful about the articulation of a creed, but she was intensely careful about the soul being open to God and responsive to His Spirit. The true life was what she aimed for, whether as a girl teaching school in Wisconsin, as a mother in her home, or as a grandmother ministering to the little children about her knee.

"She had two great dominating thoughts. You, possibly, are as familiar with them as I am. She believed in God and the human soul. She had no doubt of them, she had experience with both of them. She believed that there were many things that she did not know, but she believed that the law by which we comprehend God is the law of love, and that the law by which it shall unfold itself until it shall become like the Father is the law of love: and so, without the articulation of a creed, she insisted that we should hold ourselves as the bud on the rose, whose soul it is, receptive to the sun that shines for it and the breeze that blows upon it, open and receptive, so that under the divine sun and air we will come to be beautiful and fragrant and helpful; and so she taught that more important than the talk about God is the knowing God in the intimacy of the soul, and allowing the life to be un- folded by the direction and movement of the Divine Spirit; for God is not a far-off God, but immanent within, transcendent without, everywhere present with the strength of the Father and the tender grace of the mother.

"In the second place she was an apostle. You remember our Lord selected out of his disciples the apostles. I suppose it was no arbitrary selection. Some seeds grow into trees and develop foliage green and luxuriant but do not scatter seeds. Others as they grow gather energy from the sun and soil and dew and rain, and transmit it into the ripening flower, until with distended capsule it bursts and sends its seeds everywhere. There are men who spontaneously gather truth that they may enrich oth- ers by it. She never sought truth for truth's sake, but for humanity's sake. What cared she about phil- osophy? Let us find the truth that will feed the child, that will inspire the man, that will give him integrity, that will enable him to help humanity. That is the truth that she hunted, not to see its beauties as one turns a diamond, but a truth to be put into other lives to make them beautiful with the consciousness of God . . .

"I noted her last words were, "I have never harmed anyone.' How she thought of humanity, of the tenants on the place! I was touched today as I saw one after another, men and women and children, enter the silent room and then return with the high- est tribute that man can pay. the tribute that can- not be expressed except by the unbidden tear. All out in the cottages, out in the park, the little children knew her, the toilers knew her, and they knew that she tried to live the True Life.

"'No angel, but a dearer being, all dipt in angel instincts,

Breathing Paradise, and yet all native to her place.' "A comforter to those in sorrow, healing by her sympathetic touch those who were sick, harming none, helping all, she went through her eighty years of life and came down to her grave like a shock of corn in its season. Her name will linger; those dumb lips will speak. In the language of the apostle. 'She being dead yet speaketh.'"

WILLIAM CASPAR BLABON .- A member of an early pioneer family is William Caspar Blabon, who has made a name for himself as a successful orchardist and well driller, and has been engaged in the latter occupation throughout California. He was born September 9, 1861, on the farm of Moses

Jaa P. Quico

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HISTORY OF SANTA CLARA COUNTY

Blabon, his uncle, who resided on the Mountain View Road. His father, Walter L. Blabon, was a native of Franklin County, Maine, and his mother was Miss Anna F. White before her marriage and was born and reared in Boston, Mass. The paternal grand- father, Capt. Otis Blabon, came to California around Cape Horn in 1846, and was a member of the vigil- ance committee in the early, turbulent days. Walter L. Blabon came to California via Panama in 1860. Here he engaged in farming and in 1864 purchased 130 acres, the old homestead, which he improved with a family orchard and followed general farming. William Caspar Blabon now owns his father's old home and a part of the old farm, which he now devotes to raising prunes. He was educated at the Lincoln school and in private schools of Santa Clara County, after which he engaged in well drilling. He has continued successfully in this line of work for twenty-five years and is still engaged in developing water wells in many sections of California.

The marriage of Mr. Blabon united him with Miss Annie Beasworrick, the daughter of John and Mary E. (Billings) Beasworrick, who came from England to Santa Clara. Mr. Beasworrick was employed in the New Almaden mines for many years and there Mrs. Blabon was born. They are the parents of two children, Annie May and William Caspar, Jr. Politically Mr. Blabon is an adherent of the Republi- can party. He is at all times interested in the pro- gress and advancement of the community which has for so long been his home.

MILTON A. BOULWARE .- The advanced and eminently satisfactory state of the undertaker's pro- fession in California today is undoubtedly due to such far-seeing, idealistic and progressive men as Milton A. Boulware, the secretary of the San Jose Under- taking Company, who was born in Little Calaveras Valley, Santa Clara County, on Washington's birth- day, 1856. His father, John Wesley Boulware, a farmer in Missouri, married Miss Louisa Rebecca Lewis, and together they crossed the wide prairies in 1849, settling at first in Little Calaveras Valley. In 1860, they removed to Palo Alto; and there they continued to live until they died, aged about sixty- four years. They had seven children, and Milton was the second of the family. He attended the public schools in Santa Clara County, and then took a course in the business college; and when he was ready to do for himself, he sold merchandise in the General Farmers' Union. Next, for a number of years, he was bookkeeper for T. W. Hobson & Company, and after that, also for a number of years, bookkeeper and cashier for the Rucker Bros. Furniture Com- pany. When he left that firm, it was to assist J. E. Rucker for a couple of years in the real estate field. In 1900 he joined the staff of the San Jose Under- taking Company, and he has been here ever since.

On December 24, 1878, Mr. Boulware was married at San Jose to Miss Mary Elizabeth Rucker, the daughter of Joseph E. Rucker, a well-known pioneer realty man, and their union has been blessed with the birth of twin daughters. Helen K. is the wife of Grover C. Emmons, a minister of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and Susie W., now Mrs. J. R. Connor, whose son, Douglas Conner, is the first grandchild of Mr. and Mrs. Boulware. The family attend St. Paul's Methodist Episcopal Church; and Mr. Boulware is a member of the Royal Arch and Knights Templar Masons, and for thirty-two years

was secretary of San Jose Lodge No. 10, F. & A. M. He also belongs to the Elks, the Modern Woodmen of America, the Eastern Star and the Order of Amar- anth. In national politics a Republican, Mr. Boul- ware, who is also fond of ranch and out-door life, finds his greatest pleasure in promoting, in a non- partisan manner, whatever is to the best interests of the community.

JAMES PIERONNET PIERCE, - Prominent among the noted captains of industry who have con- tributed greatly toward the development of the re- sources of the Golden State, the late James Pieronnet Pierce, will ever be given an enviable place in Cali- fornia history. His father, Henry Miller Pierce, was born in Axminster, Devonshire, England. His mother, Susan Pieronnet, whose parents were both French, was born in Wayford, England. In 1820, she, with her parents moved from England to Friendsville, Pa., and was soon followed by Henry Miller Pierce, whose father, John Harvey Pierce, had offered $10,000 to any of his sons who would go to America to live, having great faith in the future of this country. Therefore, Henry M. got both the money and the girl he had wanted before she left England.

James P. Pierce was born at Friendsville, Pa., August 25, 1825, where he remained until he reached his majority, when he moved west to Michigan and there engaged in the business of general merchandis- ing at Constantine. There he met Miss Amelia Ann Pease, a native of Ann Arbor, whom he married at Jackson on August 25, 1852; he was then just twenty- seven years of age and she seventeen, and together they came to California in 1854, reaching San Fran- cisco by way of the Isthmus. Almost immediately they went to Yuba County and there, at Smartsville, Mr. Pierce engaged in hydraulic mining, becoming a icading operator before he sold out in 1878. He might have continued uninterruptedly in that important field had not the death of a brother-in-law, A. H. Houston, drawn him back to San Francisco to take charge of an altogether different enterprise. Mr. Houston, as early as 1867, had undertaken to build part of the sea wall along the San Francisco water front, under contract with the board of state harbor commission- ers, and when he passed away he had finished only a part of that great undertaking and had gone to great expense in quarrying and cutting granite. Mr. Pierce succeeded to Mr. Houston's interests, and success- fully completed 1130 feet of the sea wall under a new and enlarged contract, receiving as his compensation $240 per lineal foot.

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History of Santa Clara County California with biographical sketches, Part 61

Author: Sawyer, Eugene T Publication date: 1922 Publisher: Los Angeles : Historic Record Co. Number of Pages: 1934

Author: Sawyer, Eugene T
Publication date: 1922
Publisher: Los Angeles : Historic Record Co.
Number of Pages: 1934