USA > California > Solano County > History of Solano County...and histories of its cities, towns...etc. > Part 39
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HARRIER, DANIEL W., Groceries. Born in Maryland, in 1834, but re- moved to Bedford county, Penn., with his parents when still very young. In March, 1852, he emigrated to Jefferson county, Iowa, leaving it in 1854, for California ; he first settled in Sierra county in August of that year, and at once commenced mining operations. In 1861 he removed to Nevada City, Nevada county, and started a livery stable, at the same time running the stage and express line from that point through Lake City, North Bloomfield, Wolsey, Moore's Flat, and Eureka South, a dist- ance of thirty miles. In March, 1866, the subject of our memoir came to Vallejo, and taking charge of the Metropolitan Hotel (now the Sherman House) ; he remained its occupant for eighteen months. Seceding from the hotel, Mr. Harrier engaged in the occupation of stock buying, purchas- ing, also, in connection therewith, the butchering business, of John Burch- am. This transaction was effected on August 5th, 1868, and the above undertaking was carried on by him until the month of December, 1875.
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On the 27th of January, 1879, he purchased the business of J. E. Willis- ton, in the premises now occupied by his grocery store. D. W. Harrier is one of the leading men in the city. He was among those who started the Vallejo Bank, and was its President from 1876 to 1878. In 1873 he was elected City Trustee, which office he held for two years ; served on the Board of Supervisors in 1876 ; and was enrolled a School Trustee in the fall of 1877. Mr. H. married March 5, 1865, Mrs. Sarah M. Walker, the daughter of John Lee of this city. Their children are, Lizzie R., Lewis G., Victor V., Jessie V., Daniel W., Maud, and Austin.
HARVEY, HONORABLE JOEL AINSWORTH .- The subject of this me- moir was born on June 24, 1838, at Herkimer, in the county of that name, State of New York. His early days were passed on the slopes of the Hassancleaver Hills, and at the Fairfield Academy, New York, where he was grounded in that education which has, in after life, so well fitted him for the prominent positions which he has since maintained, with credit to all. In 1857 he left the Eastern States, and located in Elgin, Ills., which, after a residence of about two years, he left for California, in the spring of 1859, taking the route across the Plains, and arriving in the Golden State in the fall of that year, at Placerville. At the time the great Washoe excitements of 1860 were the talk of every one and stirred all into a phase of excitability, recalling the halcyon days of the earlier dis- coveries, he with the rest penetrated into Nevada, but not having a like . fortune with others, he drifted back with the unlucky, and finally halted at Genoa, in Carson Valley, then the capital of Western Utah.
. When the Territory of Nevada was first organized, Mr. H. was ap- pointed Clerk of Douglas county, of which Genoa was the county seat, and retained the position, from term to term, until the first month of the year 1867. While retaining this responsible office, he studied law with such success that he was admitted to its practice, and during the follow- ing year removed therefrom, and resided successively at San Francisco, Reno and Wadsworth, being employed at the latter place as agent for Wells, Fargo & Co., whence, in 1869, he was transferred to their Vallejo office. In 1871 Mr. Harvey organized the Vallejo and San Francisco Ex- press, the affairs of which he managed until 1874, when he was elected to the County Clerkship of Solano county, which distinguished position he held for two terms, and was then nominated by the Republican party for County Judge, but was defeated by the present holder, Judge John M. Gregory, Jr. In March, 1878, he resumed his practice at Vallejo, where he now resides. The honorable career of Mr. Harvey has thus far culminated in his being sent to the Convention, in June, 1878, as county delegate, he having received the largest majority of any delegate on the Republican ticket. He married August 13, 1863, Alameda L. Hub-
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bard, at Carson City, Nevada, by whom he has one son and five daughters, viz : Joel H .; Amanda L .; Mary A .; Inez A .; Blanche L., and Maude F.
HILBORN, THE HONORABLE S. G .- The subject of this sketch is a na- tive of Winot, Androscoggin county, Maine, having been born there on December 9, 1834. In early life he and his brother, E. P. Hilborn, were left orphans, when the labor of working the home-farm devolved upon these two youths. In the meantime, E. P. Hilborn emigrated to California, in the midst of their agricultural pursuits, leaving his brother to attend to the farming business, and his education ; which, as the following record shows, was crowned with success for both, E. P. Hilborn being now a prominent grain merchant of Suisun. Mr. Hilborn received the elements of that education which has brought him into such prominence in California, first at Bethel Hill, Oxford county, Maine, and afterwards at Tuft's Col- lege, where he graduated in 1859 ; afterwards becoming principal in Oak Grove Academy, Falmouth, Maine, where he remained a year, at the end of which he entered the law office of the Hon. William Pitt Fessenden, at Portland, Maine, being admitted to the bar in 1861. In this year he emi- grated to California, arriving at San Francisco, via Panama, in the month of August of the same year. Having passed a few months in the office of Whitman & Wells, a legal firm of Suisun, he removed to Vallejo, and there established himself in the practice which he now enjoys. The Hon, S. G. Hilborn is a man of mark in his county, as his public record will show, while privately he is known to be worthy of the highest esteem and respect. Since his arrival in Vallejo he has held, in order, the follow- ing places of trust and honor: City Attorney, in the year when it was incorporated ; a City Trustee for two terms; Supervisor and Senator ; while his last work of distinction has been in connection with the Consti- tutional Convention, to which he was a delegate. Mr. H. has also prac- ticed his profession with marked ability, and has been retained in a large number of the leading and most intricate cases that have had their inci- pience in the county. He is President of the Vallejo Land Improvement Company, as well as a participator in other schemes of a public and pri- vate nature. He married Lou E., second daughter of Caleb and Louisa Root, a native of Madison county, N. Y., in 1863, and has one child, Grace A.
HOBBS, ISAAC, (deceased,) born in Sanford, Summerworth county, State of Maine, 27th November, 1821. In the year 1839 he left his birthplace and went to South Boston, but remained there only a short time. From there he proceeded to Great Falls, New Hampshire, where he worked at his trade, that of millwright, remaining there till 1844, when he went to to Glowchester, New Jersey, being employed in his own trade till the
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spring of 1847, when he went to Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and set in opera- tion the machinery of several cotton mills in that place. In March, 1849, he started across the plains to California. 'On reaching Gila river, he, in company with three others, manufactured a "dug-out," and proceeded down the Pino river, calculating that the jouney would only occupy three days, and laid in provisions accordingly, but they were twenty-one days on the trip, and on getting to their destination, found the rest of the the party had preceded them by eight days. Continued the journey to San Francisco, where they arrived in October, 1849. Mr. Hobbs, asso- ciated with some others, organized a company, and, going to Bodega, erected a saw-mill, but at the time, lumber could be secured in San Fran- cisco for the simple" freight ; the mill was therefore not put in operation. He again returned to San Francisco andembarked in the business of a house- carpenter, at" sixteen dollars a day, wages. This was in the summer of 1850; in the fall of that year he visited the southern mines and engaged in prospecting until the spring of 1852, at which time he began farming on the Feather river, but, contracting fever and ague, in the fall of the year he was obliged to abandon agriculture and return to San Francisco. In April, 1853, he returned to the Atlantic coast and his native home, and on May 31 of the same year married, at McConnellville, Ohio, Miss Sarah A. Maxwell, at the residence of her sister, Mrs. C. L. Barker; she was born in Chester county, Pa., October 18, 1826. With his bride he returned to California via Panama, arriving in San Francisco November 5, 1853, · when he once more commenced business as a house-builder, which he continued till 1855, when, with his family, he came to Vallejo and en- gaged as millwright, on Mare Island. In the fall of 1859 he moved to Eel river, Humboldt county, and began farming, and remained there till the sum- mer of 1861, when they returned to Solano county and located 160 acres of land, in section 34, township 4, range 3, on the Suscol ranch, but on March 3, 1863, a bill was passed by Congress giving the land back to its original owner, (who claimed it under the Spanish grant,) when they were removed by the Sheriff of the county. Mr. H. then returned to Vallejo, in 1865, and was elected Sheriff in 1869 for a term of two years. Once more Mr. Hobbs visited (in 1876) the scenes of his youth, as well as the Centennial Exhibition, returning to Vallejo, but never again engaged in active busi- ness up to the time of his death, which occurred on February 12, 1878. He was a Mason of old and high standing, as also a member of the Val- lejo Pioneer Association. Their children are: Mary B., born at Vallejo April 17, 1857 ; Ida S., born April 7, 1859; Eunice Esther, born at Eel river, Humboldt county, February 26, 1861; Charles B., born in Sulphur Spring valley, Solano county, August 22, 1863 ; Heila Grace, born in Val- lejo, November 21, 1865, and Maxwell, born May 17, 1872. There are two infants deceased : George, born August 17, 1855, and died July 27, 1864 ; Isacc, born December 21, 1865, and died September 27, 1869.
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HUBBARD, JOHN E., retail dealer in domestic wines, cigars, etc., was born in Santiago, Chile, South America, in 1842, and in 1848 came with his parents to San Francisco, where his father opened the first brass foundry and coppersmith shop on the coast. Remained in San Francisco till 1852, when the family removed to Santa Clara county, the subject of this sketch being sent to school there. In 1857 he accompanied his pa- rents back to Chile, and with them returned to California after a stay of two years in South America. In 1860 Mr. Hubbard proceeded to Santa Clara, and there was engaged by the firm of Hobich & Bros., general merchants, as clerk; in 1862 he returned to San Francisco and entered the office of the Provost Marshal, continuing there till 1864, when he visited the Eastern States with his father and sister. At the end of four- teen months he returned to California, and having resided for four months at Benicia, he went to San Jose, where he was employed for the best part of four years in the firms of T. W. Spring & Co., and N. Hayes. In 1869 he once more visited San Francisco, where he was appointed a Deputy Sheriff. He visited Mexico and Oregon in 1870, and arrived in Vallejo in the fall of that year, after which he proceeded to Napa, Humboldt bay, the Sandwich Islands, and in 1871, returned to Vallejo, where he has since permanently resided. He opened his present business in February, 1877. Is unmarried.
HUBBS, THE HONORABLE PAUL K., (deceased), one of that class of Pioneers whose memory those who are left behind delight to honor, and who labored to bring the State of California into the proud position of being one of the foremost in the Union, was a descendant of another class of Pioneers, his ancestors being of that band of Quaker families who emigrated from England to America in Anno Domini 1650, and settled in Rhode Island. He was born on March 27, 1800, near Woodstown, in Salem county, New Jersey, and received his schooling in Philadelphia, where he was well grounded in the necessary education of the period. Early in life Mr. Hubbs essayed work on a farm, which in a sketch of his life he describes thus : "My father again moving to the old homestead and requiring all possible help, I had to leave the old frame school- house, corner of Race and Juniper, and at eleven years old take charge of a team and go through a course of agricultural studies ; more health- ful I thought to the body than the mind. All the steam then that con- tributed to the plowing was raised from the person of man and horse. The reaping was done as in the time of Ruth. We shelled corn by hand across an iron bar and done flail threshing on rainy days, nor was our mowing accomplished by patent. Don't talk about good old times ; those were weary days to the farmer-up before daylight to wade through snow and sleet and slush and rain and ice to prepare and donate feed for
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horses preparatory to a day's work, ending late in the evening. Yet the toil and hardship of the day gave us good appetites and sweet sleep preparatory to a renewal of the same lack of variety, save the change from storm to sunshine and from sunshine to storm, and from intense cold to man-melting heat. Thanks to Almighty God, the small com- munities of those days were strictly honest, with rare exception. The Bible and the newspaper were read with equal confidence in their truth." Mr. Hubbs did not long pursue farming as an occupation, for he shortly afterwards received a position in a wholesale dry goods store on No. 23 North Front street, Philadelphia, and while there it happened that Judge Kinsay, after whom he had been named, had arrived in the city to pur- sue his professional practice, and at once took young Hubbs in hand, keeping him reading law or attending law courts during the evening. About this time he entered into his first mercantile transaction on his own account. He had been noticed by the mate of a vessel trading to Porto Rico, who inquired how much capital he had at his disposal. The reply was "nine dollars." With this sum his friend advised him to in- vest in twelve barrels of apples, which he did ; his goods were taken by the brig, and two months thereafter he found gazetted in the morning paper of Imports " 20 bags coffee to Paul K. Hubbs." From his extreme youth, then but 13 years, he had some difficulty in convincing the Cus- toms authorities of his honesty ; eventually, however, his produce was cleared, a position in the store was granted to him whereat he might dis- pose of his consignment, which he soon did, realizing the sum of $140, to him a fabulous outturn indeed. He was not carried away by this turn of Fortuna's wheel, however, for with the proceeds of this venture he in- vested still further, always attended with a reasonable profit. Mr. Hubbs next visited New York for the first time, on certain legal business, which place he reached by stage and steamer, the latter commanded by Cor- nelius Vanderbilt, with whom he had a little passage of words, which would appear to have made so deep an impression on the Captain that the point urged by Hubbs was gained. At this period the British were before Baltimore and Philadelphia was alarmed. Citizens were called upon to throw up breastworks over the Schuylkill and other defensible points in the construction of which he entered with the vigor of youth, and shortly after, when on a collecting tour in Virginia, he saw the havoc of war and the ruins of houses and homesteads occasioned by the hos- tilities which then raged between the United States and the British. On his return, through the failure of the firm in which he had served, Mr. H. found himself out of employment, and after for a while suffering the heartburnings and misery of seeking for work, answering advertisements and seeing his little ready coin dwindling into insignificance, he was taken into the counting-house of J. and M. Brown and M. D. Lewis, the
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leading firm of Philadelphia, with whom he worked as book-keeper and afterwards as cashier, and at the end of a lease of faithful service he was established by the firm, whose business had greatly increased, in a branch of the house situated on the south side of Market street, under the name of Paul K. Hubbs, in which he was admitted a partner, which in 1826, at the time of a great crisis, was dissolved by mutual consent, and the assets divided. As a proof of the marvelous uprightness and proper feeling of Mr. Hubbs, the following anecdote is taken from his note book: " Nicholas Biddle, then the great financial spirit of the United States, remarked one day to a coterie at the Exchange, as I passed, 'There goes the sharpest man of Market street!' I heard it, and it pained me. I sought almost imme- diately an interview and remarked, 'Mr. Biddle, you have ruined me; I heard your remark as I passed; we are all of us afraid of sharp men. Say that I am industrious and know my business, but don't, I pray you, ever call me sharp.' 'Well, Hubbs,' said he, 'this only convinces me that I was right, but I am enlightened by the truism of your suggestion!'" In his manhood, though attending with strict devotion to the cares of his business, the subject of this sketch found time to take a part in the philantrophies of the time, which were then being largely cared for by Mathew Carey, a name which will remain engraven on the early history of Philadelphia as an advocate of American manufactures and home in- dustry generally. In 1827, Mr. H. erected the first calico print works in Pennsylvania at "The Lagrange," on the Pennepack near Bustleton, now the twenty-third ward of the city of Philadelphia, and in 1828 we find him acting as Secretary for "The Society of Internal Improvement of Pennsylvania," having associated with him Chief Justice Tilghman, Peter S. Duponceon, John Sergeant, John J. Borie, Charles J. Ingersoll, and five merchants who formed an active committee of ten. It was dif- ficult to obtain a Legislature willing to take hold of so vast an enter- prise. Mr. Hubbs thus describes a session where a startling innovation was mooted; "The committee was assembled at the 'Indian Queen,' Fourth street, one evening. The sub-committee reported the situation above named. John Sergeant, (candidate for Vice-President with Mr. Clay afterward), Chairman of Committee, in his seat and I at his side as Secretary. We were busy about details, when Mr. Ingersoll came in. He at once commenced : ‘ Mr. Chairman, I have a matter that I deem to be of great importance to the committee; I think we can eclipse New York. I am reliably informed that transportation can be successfully made at cheap rates by running wagons prepared for the purpose over parallel bars of iron. The experiment has been successfully tried at an English colliery, reducing their expenses two-thirds, with mere play for the horses. Let us apply.' Mr. Ingersoll!' ejaculated Mr. Sergeant from
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the chair, ' we are just completing our well laid plans of success in mak- ing a grand canal, and I hope you will not come here with your flights of fancy.' 'Well,' says Mr. Ingersoll, 'dig your ditch, but I shouldn't be surprised to see it some day covered by parallel bars of iron.' This was the first I ever heard of railroads, and I took occasion to remark that ' such a thing might do in England, but our Pennsylvania frosts would forbid it here.' We went on, and after wonderful log rolling obtained a law and a canal and a final debt of $42,000,000 to Pennsylvania." In 1830 he visited Europe, staying at many of the most picturesque spots in Great Britain, and happened to be in London at the time of the corona- tion of King William IV., which is thus amusingly described by Mr. Hubbs : "My banker was too late for Westminster Abbey, but obtained me a stand in a parlor nearly opposite St. James' Palace, whence the cavalcade would issue, and where the children of the Lord Mayor and myself could see everything of the move. The Duchess of Kent would not let little Vic., then some fourteen years old, go in the procession. Earl somebody, one of Billy's naturals, fixed up the whole matter, and Vic's place was not the right one, and she didn't ride then ; but she did afterward, God bless her! William looked very like old General Cadwal- ader. The Queen had a square face and a princely Dutch noseindicative of bad humor. They shouted, 'Long live King William the Fourth!' I shouted, 'Hurrah for Billy Guelph !' I thought that was about the right sort of American manner, and let it out." After his sojourn in England, Mr. Hubbs crossed over to France with which he was much charmed, and after visiting many places of mark he once more sailed to America in the packet " Sally," commanded by Captain Pell, but as the voyage thither was undertaken solely for the purpose of bringing his wife to share with him the pleasures of sight-seeing, he once more sailed from American shores. The port of destination this time was Marseilles, through the Straits of Gibralter and up the Meditereanean, and again he landed in la belle France ; and on April 4, his son Anthony was born in Lyons ; and it was in this city that he received his first taste of Revolutionary France, in the year 1834.
From this city, Mr. Hubbs made the tour of Europe. To follow him on, which is impossible, for want of space; and early in 1836 he took ship for home from Havre; but encountering a hurricane in the English Channel, being saved from shipwreck on the rock-bound coast of Devon- shire, as it were, by a miracle, he landed in New York without further adventure, and proceeded thence to the home of his youth. The change found in Philadelphia after so protracted an absence was very marked. Men whom he had left struggling, he found in opulence ; while those who were at the top of the ladder of commercial and financial fame had suc- cumbed to make or mar no more. In 1837 Mr. Hubbs owned the Mil-
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hausen Print Works, then located below the Navy Yard, in Philadelphia, which were destroyed in September, 1839, by fire, through mismanage- ment on the part of the fire company ; but with that rectitude of mind which has always characterized his dealings, and that perseverance which would stand no brooking, he paid off every dollar lost by the fire, and bought in a large portion of the Pennypack Mills. Hereafter he took part in the politics of the State, which led him into much prominence, and in 1841 was elected Colonel of the Third Regiment, Pennsylvania militia, which had a share in the subduing of the fanaticism that culmi- nated in the church riots. In the midst of the great excitement of the retirement of Henry Clay, whom Col. Hubbs in his sketch, eulogizes in glowing terms, he was offered by Mr. Tyler, the Consulate at Paris, and subsequently by Mr. Polk, the like position at San Francisco, which he declined, for what were to him good and sufficient reasons ; and was pres- ent in Washington during the excitement of the declaration of war against Mexico. Mr. Dalles was then enthusiastic to procure California as well as Oregon, then comprising what is now all west of the Missouri between 42 and 49 of latitude ; and it was when in the Capital that he was first introduced to General Winfield Scott, the veteran and accom- plished Chief of the American army.
A new era now opened itself for Col. Hubbs. California had become the popular talk of the Eastern States ; he had read Emory's Notes on the country south from Salt Lake to California, and Fremont's Rocky Mountain and California campaign ; then came reports of gold, he, there- fore, for his star had not latterly been in the ascendant as regards finan- cial success, determined to emigrate, his first idea being to attempt the overland journey, which he agreed to undertake in company with his cousin, Ira Burdsall, Frank Tilford, a Mr. Wingate and Bryant, the author of "What I saw in California." Falling sick, however, this journey was given up by him, but, nothing daunted, he wound up his affairs, resigned his posts of honor, responsibility and trust and, notwith- standing inducements of a flattering order being held out, he finally sailed for California on May 3, 1849, in the ship " Susan G. Owens," his wife and children accompanying him. His description of the scene on the wharf is full of pathos and teems with humane feeling, clothed in words which, though in prose, vie in interest with the immortal lives of Childe Harold's Farewell from the halls of his youth. The good ship, with its precious freight of human beings, proceeded on its journey and, with the exception of one or two disagreeables, incidental to a long sea voyage, touched at Rio de Janiero and Valparaiso and arrived in San Francisco at noon, on October 12, 1849. The first impressions of Californian life are graphically described by his son, for Col. Hubbs did not live to finish the sketch of his life with his own pen. In December, 1849, we find the
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