USA > California > Tulare County > History of Tulare County, California with biographical sketches > Part 45
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The M. E. Church also has religious services every Sunday ; a Sabbath-school is also maintained.
There are various secret and benevolent societies; such as Workmen, Legion of Honor, Odd Fellows, Knights of Pythias, Good Templars, Masons, etc.
NEWSPAPERS OF BAKERSFIELD.
The Kern County Californian is published every Saturday, by A. C. Maude. It is now in it fourth volume. Its edi- torials are able. Its local county news is always very large. The influence and enterprise of the Californian has added much to the prosperity of Kern County. It has handled all current subjects in an able manner. It has done much by re- views of the various resources of the counties to attract atten- tion to the advantages it possesses. Mr. Maude was for some time engaged in real estate, and other business in Bakersfield, and is therefore the more fully posted on its resources. He is also United States Commissioner, and Notary Public.
The Kern County Gazette is published by George W. Wear, whose residence forms one of the views of the pretty homes of Bakersfield. George W. Wear is a native of Carroll County, Mississippi. A self-made man, and an energetic, industrious printer, who thoroughly understands his business. He grew to manhood in the South, and at the breaking out of the war remained with his native soil. The Gazette is a nine-column paper, is attractive and ably conducted. Mr. Wear has just put a new Cottrell cylinder press and steam power into his office. He has lately purchased the material of the Record, and has thus largely increased his business and circulation.
The Kern Weekly Record had reached its third volume when it became consolidated with the Gazette. It was estab- lished by John H. Lee.
The Temperance Banner is also published in Bakersfield. The first number was issued in April, 1883, Cora Petty, Edi-
tress, and in its salutatory it says: "We are confident that there is a good field here for temperance work, but it is yet a matter of conjecture if the field will yield a support for an advocate of the cause. A town of the population of Bakers- field, that can make a showing of probably twenty-five saloons, certainly is a proper field for the temperance worker."
BUSINESS HOUSES OF BAKERSFIELD.
H. H. FISH is proprietor of the Union Livery and Sale Sta- bles, which he has had illustrated for this work. These large stables are situated on Tenth Street. It is the depot of the Summer and Bakersfield 'Bus Co. The building has recently been enlarged and otherwise improved and ventilated. He has one of the largest and finest stocks in California, south of San Francisco, of buggies and carriages, with double teams, for hire on reasonable terms; also good saddle horses and mules, which will be hired to go to any part of the country at moderate rates.
J. NIEDERAUR has a large building on the main street, which is occupied by him as a furniture dealer and undertaker. A glance at the illustration of this business place will give some idea of its extent. He keeps a complete assortment of furni- ture and bedding, wall paper, looking-glasses, picture frames, brackets, upholstery, carpets, etc. Jobbing and repairing done in good style and at short notice. Metallic caskets, wood cas- kets, and coffins of all sizes and descriptions always on hand. A hearse, second to none in southern California, is always kept in readiness.
THE KERN VALLEY BANK, at Bakersfield, has a capital of $53,000. It furnishes exchanges on all Eastern and European cities. It loans on approved securities; pays highest price for county scrip: makes collections; and allows interest on term deposits. Sol. Jewett, President; Charles W. Fore, Cashier.
J. S. DRURY is a wholesale and retail dealer in drugs and medicines, paints, oils, varnishes, etc.
BORGWARDT & MCCORD are wholesale and retail dealers in fresh and salted meats, hams, bacon, lard, etc. All kinds of German sausages constantly on hand.
PAUL GALTES is a wholesale and retail dealer in groceries and provisions, dry goods, clothing, fancy goods, boots, shoes, hats, fine wines and liquors, tobacco and cigars, hardware, tinware, woodenware, etc. Always on hand the best assortment in the ladies' department.
E. G. MILLER is proprietor of the City Brewery. He manu- factures and keeps on hand superior and pure lager beer, infe- rior to none in the State. His wines, liquors and cigars are all of the best quality. Attached to the brewery is a first- class bowling alley, fitted up with all the conveniences, and located in a shady, cool place; also a nice, well-arranged shoot- ing gallery, for the amusement of guests. He has been at great expense to arrange the brewery and make it a first- class establishment.
218
WATER SUPPLY OF KERN COUNTY.
Water Supply of Kern County.
THE first and most important consideration in a section where agricultural success is wholly dependent upon irrigation, as in Kern County, is that of the water supply, for upon its perma- nence and volume depend the wealth and prosperity of the community. Fortunately Kern River, which is the sole source of supply for all that portion of the San Joaquin Valley south of Tulare Lake, is an unnavigable stream of large volume, whose waters can be entirely diverted without injury to any public interest, and whose discharge, though variable, is un- failing. The river heads among the loftiest peaks of the Sierra Nevada, whose ice fields and beds of snow only yield to the heat of midsummer, furnishing a great volume of water long after the winter rains on the lower mountains have drained away. The rains of winter and the melting snows of summer thus maintain the full flow of the stream through the first seven months of the year, the season of greatest demand.
PHYSICAL FEATURES OF KERN RIVER.
From the longest fork of the river to the mouth of the cañon, the distance is about 115 miles, in which it falls 10,000 to 12,000 feet, in a series of cascades, through wild, rocky cañons, alternating with short, level reaches in park-like valleys. From the point where it leaves the mountains it flows for eighteen miles between high, gravelly bluffs, entering the plains a short distance above the Southern Pacific Rail- road Bridge, the latter fourteen miles having an average slope of eight feet per mile. It follows a southwesterly course from the railroad bridge toward Buena Vista Lake, flowing in a shallow bed of coarse sand, 300 to 800 feet wide, with an average inclination of six feet per mile, to Buena Vista Slough, where its waters part, a portion flowing south, into Buena Vista Lake, when unobstructed, and the remainder seeking an outlet northward, in Tulare Lake, throughi fifty miles of swamp land.
The elevation of the river at the railroad bridge is 408 feet above the mean tide datum plane established by the State Engineers Department, while the two lakes, Kern and Buena Vista, which occupy the lowest and southernmost portion of the valley, have an elevation, when full, of about 290 feet.
FAVORABLE FOR IRRIGATION.
Kern River has a slope through the valley of from six to eight feet per mile, and lies in a shallow sandy bed, with banks of sandy soil three to six feet high. These favorable condi- tions enable water to be taken from it at almost any point with a minimum of cost. No permanent dams or expensive headworks are necessary ; a simple wing-dam of sand and brush, running out into the channel at an acute angle up the stream, serves every purpose of diverting water into the canals.
These wing-dams are liable to be swept away with every freshet, but as they are inexpensive, no serious loss is entailed.
But one dam-that of the Kern Island Canal-was ever constructed across the river, and this has been finally aban- doned, on account of the heavy cost of maintaining it in repair. It was built of brush mattresses, staked and weighted down with gravel. It cost, originally, $7,000, and subsequent repairs for three years cost nearly $12,000. It rested upon a bed of quicksand, which was constantly being undermined, and every freshet rent a hole through the body of the dam. When the dam was abandoned, the canal was simply extended about half a mile further up stream, and a wing-dam of sand thrown out, diverting all the water required.
The ease with which water can be diverted from Kern River accounts for the great number of canals and ditches which have been taken from it at all points, there being no less than thirty-two, large and small. It would be better if there were fewer, as the division of water into so many channels gives rise to a great loss in the river in reaching the lower ones-a much greater loss than would occur if all the water were di- verted into two main canals, where it emerges from the foot- hills, with regularly laid out distributaries running therefrom to all the irrigated lands. There are specified times for irriga- tion, divided into periods depending upon the kind of crop.
After July no general irrigation is practiced except for alfalfa, late potatoes, and vegetables, although water is run in all the canals for stock purposes. Alfalfa is irrigated at any time during the year from January to October, and while there is much of it that is never irrigated, receiving moisture from the permanent stratum of surface water which in places its roots find at a depth of five to six feet, on other soils less favor- able to its growth, it may be necessary to water it every five to six weeks from the latter part of January to the first of October. The mean between these extremes in alfalfa lands is a compact alluvial soil, which retains moisture a long time and requires not more than two or three irrigations in the whole season.
We are satisfied that many attempts which have been made to grow alfalfa, and which proved failures, were attributable to the selection of improper soil. Thin soils and compact clay soils should be avoided, for in neither will it succeed to satis- faction. It will succeed, however, in a light soil which has a permeable subsoil consisting of loam, or sand or gravel, into which its roots can penetrate.
VARIOUS WAYS OF IRRIGATION.
Sub-surface irrigation, or the wetting of the ground by under-ground percolation, is practiced to a considerable extent, but the area over which the system is practicable is compara- tively limited, and is confined to a few thousand acres on Kern Island. For this system the old channels, or blind sloughs, that ramify through the country, are used. These are, gener-
219
EXTENT OF IRRIGATION IN KERN.
ally, but shallow troughs, with flat sloping sides. Temporary dams are thrown across them, and they are filled with water from the nearest ditch. Percolation from them extends from 500 to 1,500 feet laterally. Where there are no natural chan- nels convenient the fields are surrounded by ditches, which are kept full of standing water as long as may be necessary to wet the inclosed field. A great deal of land in various por - tions of Kern Island is thus sub-irrigated by the natural per- colation from the canals.
EFFECT OF IRRIGATION ON SOIL.
It is a noticeable fact that upon all the sandy soils, at least, which form the principal area of the lands under cultivation, the effect of years of irrigation has been a marked increase in their fertility and . an apparent change in their composition. Water and cultivation disintegrate the coarser particles of the soil, and the fertilizing elements contained become dissolved and prepared for plant growth. In filtering through the por- ous soil all the sediment and fertilizing matter contained by the water is detained and acts as a perpetual restorative. Rich fields, producing large annual crops, are to be seen in Kern Island, that were barren wastes of pure sand before irrigation reclaimed and fertilized them. A common method of treat- ing the sandy hillocks and bare spots that occur at intervals, is to corral sheep on them for a few weeks at a time. We have no data for establishing the rate of increase in the productive ca- pacity of the land, but the general opinion seems to be that the average yield is greater, all other conditions being equal, as irrigation progresses.
EFFECT OF IRRIGATION ON CLIMATE.
The change for the better in the climate of the country, since the general introduction of irrigation, has been as marked as the improvement in the soil. Old sloughs contain- ing stagnant water have been purified by the introduction of fresh running water through them. Jungles of miasma-breeding willows have been cleared, swamps drained and dried out, and much decaying vegetation destroyed. Malarious fevers were formerly very prevalent, but have been much abated by these measures. How much the change of climate can be attributed to the influence of irrigation, if any, cannot be conjectured; but irrigation has certainly had no deleterious effects, or else they have been greatly overbalanced by the sanitary results of drainage and clearing.
EXTENT OF IRRIGATION.
The total area of land irrigated in Kern Valley from Kern River, in 1879, was 38,800 acres, of which about one-third (according to an approximate estimate) was devoted to alfalfa, and the remainder to cereals-chiefly wheat and barley, In- dian corn, potatoes, and miscellaneous products. This com- prises almost the whole of the lands under cultivation in the valley, as but few acres were in cultivation which were
not irrigated directly by surface flooding, or indirectly by percolation from artificial channels or natural water-courses used as irrigating canals. Of this area, probably one-fifth had never been irrigated prior to 1879.
FIRST CANALS CONSTRUCTED.
Prior to 1873, comparatively little land was irrigated. The only canals existing at the beginning of that year were (1), the Kern Island, completed only to Bakersfield, and irrigating a limited amount of land around the town; (2), the ditches taking water from the Old South Fork, irrigating a few hun- dred acres north of Bakersfield and in the vicinity of the old settlement of Panama; (3), the Castro Ditch; (4), the Stine, partially completed by farmers who had formerly taken water directly from Old River, at different points; (5), the Buena Vista, supplying what was known as the Barnes Settlement, by means of an old natural slough, which has since been aban- doned for an artificial channel, cut on higher ground, nearly parallel to the slough; (6), and the James Canal, then a much smaller channel than it now is. The total amount irrigated by these probably did not exceed 5,000 acres. No water was diverted on the north side of the river.
LIST OF CANALS.
At present there are some thirty-two ditches taking water from Kern River. The following table gives the names of the canals, acres irrigated, etc., in the year 1880 :-
TABLE.
gated ...
inclusive ..
irrigation, Jan'y to July,
Total amount of water for
Average discharge per sec-
cover land irrigated if all|
ter taken from river would
Average depth to which wa-
North Side :-
Beardsley ..
450
155,000,000
8.4
7.9
C'alloway
3,000
1,760,000,000
96.0
13.47
McCord .
765
320,000,000
17.5
9.6
McCaffrey
280
177,000,000
9.7
14.5
Emery
20
60,000,000
3.2
68.8
Jones & Tuckey.
55
68,000,000
3.7
28.4
Wible
260
31,000,000
1.7
Pioneer ...
3,450
877,000,000
47.8
5.9
Johnson .. .
150
94,500,000
5.2
14.46
Dixon & Joice,
45,000,000
2.4
South Side :-
Kern Island.
9,860
1,910,000,000 104.2
4.4
Farmers' ..
5,344
S40,000,000
45.8
5.85
Spanish, or Castro
300
86,000,000
4.7
6.6
Stine ..
7,245
1,761,000,000
96.1
5.6
Baker & Noble ...
1,140
200,000,000
10.9
4.0
Gates
325
59,000,000
3.2
4.1
Buena Vista.
1,920
418,500,000
22.9
5.0
James ..
-
3,400
556,000,000
30.3
3.75
Plunkett
785
51,000,000
2.8
1.5
Wilson
52
9,000,000
0.5
4.0
Total.
38,S01
10,184,000,000 555.6
ond in cubic feet. .
applied ..
NAME OF CANAL.
Total number of acres irri-
131,000,000
7.2
14.2
Railroad.
James & Dixon.
54,000,000
3.0
Old South Fork
521,000,000
28.4
Meacham
220
SKETCHES OF PROMINENT CITIZENS.
Biographies of Citizens.
SOLOMON JEWETT, of Bakersfield, Kern County, was born in Weybridge, Vermont, in 1835, where he lived until of age, on his parents' farm, having the principal charge of it after the age of sixteen years.
His father and grandfather were large sheep owners, for that State, owning as many as 6,000 at one time. Our subject took early to the business, purchasing his first sheep at the age of six years, paying $3.00 therefor, which increased, and with trad- ing gave him a start of $950 at the age of twenty-one years, when he left for Nebraska where he stayed two years.
Then with his brother started for Pike's Peak during the excitement of 1859. Arriving at Fort Kearney and finding the news of Pike's Peak unfavorable, they came together to California, landing at Placerville September, 1859. They went from there to Murderers Bar, and worked in the river diggings one month for wages, and then tried placer mining for them- selves, but with poor success.
In 1860, they received 105 French Merino Bucks from the East by steamer, which our subject sold at an average of $316 each.
In the fall of 1860 he came to Kern County, took 3,300 ewes on shares, and purchased 2,000 in company with Thomas Bull, a banker of San Francisco, for $6,00 a head. The first clip brought $154 over and above the expense of shearing and deliv- ering in San Francisco.
The next year sheep dropped from $6.00 to $1.00 per head. The years 1863-64 were dry years, and during that time Mr. Jewett devoted his whole time to the sheep, losing but few. In 1864 sheep fell to 50 cents per head; 1865 was a good year, and Mr. Jewett drove 3,000 wethers to San Francisco, realizing $3.20 per head, which cleared him from debt, and left himself and brother with 8,000 sheep, which was after- wards increased to 20,000.
In 1865 in company with Messrs. Livermore and Chester, he purchased the "Cotton Ranch," and cleared, made irriga- ting ditches, and put in 133 acres of cotton, one of three of the first crops raised in California.
Seeing the necessity of providing his sheep with winter feed, he commenced to raise alfalfa hay, and was one of the first to ad- vocate the producing of it, and has at the present time about 2,000 acres sufficient to cut 12,000 tons of hay in a season.
Mr. Jewett has always been one of the foremost breeders of fine sheep in the State, having imported several hundred from the East. His sales amount to thousands of dollars yearly; selling them all over California, and sending them into Oregon, Nevada, Montana, Utah, Colorada, and Texas.
In company with Livermore & Chester, he put up the first frame building in Bakersfield. He has been identified with the growth and prosperity of Bakersfield from the start, and aids in promoting every enterprise for the development of town and county.
In 1875 he started the Kern Valley Bank, of which he is now President. Mr. Jewett lives one mile from Bakersfield on his home farm, and has a wife and four children.
JAMES C. CROCKER, the subject of this notice, was born in Oneida County, New York, on the 20th day of January, 1830, but before arriving at his majority, he went to Pulaski, Oswego County, where he engaged in the occupation of butch- ering, which he followed with average success up to the time when the California gold excitement broke out.
Being of a sanguine temperament, and full of the spirit of adventure, he determined to try his fortune in the El Dorado of promise. He left New York by steamer in June. 1850, coming by way of Panama, where he was detained some time in con- sequence of the riots that broke out while he was there, and he did not arrive in San Francisco until August of the same year, having been nine months on his way from New York.
He immediately went to Greenwood Valley, in El Dorado County, where he engaged in mining for a limited time with average success, but observing that there was a good prospect for a butcher, he determined to try his hand at his old trade again, which he did during several years, with varied success. Subsequently, about the year 1860, he moved to the county of San Joaquin, where he became acquainted with Miss Mary Smith, his present amiable wife, whom he married in the year 1862. They have now living five children, two boys, Edwin and Frederick, and three girls, Clara, Nellie, and Bertha.
After his marriage he resided in San Joaquin County, up to the year 1868, when the great excitement in regard to taking up farming lands was at its height, when the plains on the west side were being dotted with houses and farms as far up as Hill's Ferry, and as bad or worse for stock owners on the east side, where the settlers were killing hundreds of cattle for trespassing on their fenceless crops. The outlook was gloomy, green fields and pastures now seemed to be the best solution of the situation. So Crocker concluded very promptly to make one more move,and this time to Kern County, where he engaged in the business of stock-raising more vigorously than ever before, and with gratifying success up to the year 1877 (the dry year we call it here), when he lost a great many cat- tle on account of the scarcity of grass.
From the experience of this year he learned that the native grasses of this dry country are not a reliable dependence for a large amount of stock, so he commenced buying land in the farming and irrigating district, about eight miles south of Bakersfield, and nine miles from Sumner the nearest depot, and now he has 1,760 acres under a substantial board fence,
221
SKETCHES OF PROMINENT CITIZENS.
with miles of subdivision fences of the same sort; 1,350 aeres of alfalfa grass, which is indispensable for stock, a good resi- denee, with all other buildings necessary and convenient to conduct the business. The soil is mostly of the best quality, being alluvial deposit, and produces alfalfa most abundantly, averaging two tons of hay per acre the first cutting, and nearly as much at the second cutting, and green pasture ever afterwards; cultivates no other crop. Has an orchard of sev- eral hundred trees, large and small; only for family use. Has about 1,250 head of stock cattle; about 155 head of horses and mares, including spring colts; about 800 head of hogs, and 600 sheep.
Blessed with a good constitution, indomitable pluck and per- severance, and a clear head for business, the subject of this notice has succeeded in placing himself on a solid busi- ness basis. As a man he is true to his friends, hospitable to the stranger, and just to all men. In Kern County he is es- teemed the model citizen.
A. T. LIGHTNER, whose portrait appears in this work, is one of the oldest native Californians in the State, having been born in San Bernardino County, January 1, 1850. He was the youngest of a family of nine children. His parents moved into and resided in Santa Clara County until 1857, when they moved into Kern County, which was at that time a part of Tulare County.
His early years-up to the age of fifteen-were spent in at- tending school in Santa Clara County. Between the years 1866 and 1876 he was engaged in stoek-raising-principally cattle and horses.
In March, 1876, he was engaged as Office Deputy in the Sheriff's office, serving for two years, during the term of M. P. Wells. In September, 1879, he was elected to the office of County Clerk, and also served as Recorder of Kern County. He was re-elected to the same office in November, 1882, and is still serving in that eapacity.
WILLIAM TYLER, the present County Auditor, was born in Napierville, Canada East, June 20, 1836. He came to San Francisco, May 17, 1859. He came to this county and engaged in mining in 1865. Being present at the birth of the county, he remembers the incidents attending that event. His hand- writing appears upon the early records, although he was not an officer until he was elected to his present position, to which his many qualifications admirably fit him to faithfully dis- charge.
ALEXANDER B. MACPHERSON, the present able Superintend- ent of Schools of Kern County, is a native of Glasgow, Seot- land, where he was born March 20, 1839. He moved to the Highlands of Scotland in 1840, where his father, Alex. Mae- pher-on, engaged in milling. He afterwards migrated to Can- ada in a sailing vessel, consuming fifty-three days.
The subject of our sketch left New York for California, by way of Panama, and reached San Francisco May 7, 1864, and engaged as a laborer on a farm near Capland. From June to October, 1864, he was engaged in book-keeping in San Fran- cisco, and in Sacramento at other business.
He came to Kern County in 1867, and engaged in contract- ing for the Joe Walker Mining Company. He was elected Superintendent of Schools in 1882.
He married Miss Mary Jane Freeman, in 1876, who was a native of Texas. The names of their children are: Alexander Ross, Eucebie Valeria, and Veronica Macpherson.
JACOB NIEDERAUR .- The subject of this sketch was born in Bavaria, in the year 1841, and is a son of Diedriek and Bar- bara Niederaur. He came to America with his parents and brothers (of whom he has three) and sister, in 1853, and set- tled with them in Bryan, Ohio, where his parents resided almost continuously the balance of their lives. His mother died in 1868, and his father in 1879, the latter being seventy- nine years of age when he died. Mr. Diedriek Niederaur was a cabinetmaker, and taught all four of his sons the trade. Two of them still remain in Bryan; are sole proprietors of the large business built up by their father and themselves, and are well-to-do, thriving men. No doubt Jacob might have been one of the firm, had he been content to remain at home and work at the beneh; but his was a nature which craved advent- ure, and in pursuit of it he, in 1861, enlisted for three years as a musician in the Thirty-eighth Ohio Regiment, and served under General Thomas. He was discharged after serving less than two years, by Aet of Congress, mustering out of service the military bands. He was engaged in the battles of Mill Springs, Pittsburg Landing, Shiloah, and other minor affrays. After his discharge from the army, he returned home; but soon tiring of the old haunts, he started, in the fall of 1863, for California. He spent six years in the mines of Montana, Idaho, and Nevada; and, after a eheekered career, in which he neither succeeded in making a fortune, nor failed at all times to satisfy the eravings of hunger, he left White Pine for Kern County, in 1869, and arrived in Bakersfield, in December of the same year. His earthly possessions at this time consisted of a pack and saddle horse and a eamping outfit. Having now come to the conclusion that, as a money-making business, mining was too uncertain, he practically abandoned it, and began work at the beneh as a carpenter, at which he labored steadily for four years. In the meantime, with his partner, Dan Hughes, who had shared the ups and downs of mining life with him for the last five years in which he followed it, they pre-empted a half-seetion of land, Dan giving his time to the tilling and improving of the ranch, while Niederaur furnished the capital. Finding that the ranch was eating up all his hard-earned funds, without giving any adequate return, the partners concluded they were not eut out for farmers, and
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