USA > California > Kings County > History of Tulare and Kings counties, California, with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the counties who have been identified with their growth and development from the early days to the present > Part 78
USA > California > Tulare County > History of Tulare and Kings counties, California, with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the counties who have been identified with their growth and development from the early days to the present > Part 78
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his home with his son and his widow continued to live with him until she passed away February 14, 1913, at Porterville, where both of them were buried, and their memory will ever be held in high reverence for the lives of high principles and honor which they had led, to say nothing of their energetic efforts and achievements in their chosen field, which ever command unselfishness and untiring industry and conrage, marked traits in their characters.
William A. Sears was born in Milan, Sullivan county, Mo., De- cember 14, 1860, and lived in Oregon from 1862 to 1874. In the common school of Polk county, Ore., he received his elementary ednea- tion and also at the schools of Golden, Colo., where he completed the high school course. Upon arriving in California he matriculated at the Normal school at San Jose and was graduated with the class of 1882. Eager to complete a law course he had read law with his unele, the Hon. A. H. DeFrance, while he was in Colorado. Hon. DeFrance was then First Territorial Senator, then State Senator and then was appointed Supreme Court Commissioner, and later was elected United States District Judge from Colorado, which office he held with great honor until his death. He was also attorney for the Colorado Central Railroad Co., and under his able supervision Mr. Sears imbibed the rudiments of legal training which have served him to no mean purpose in his real estate and other business interests. After coming to Cali- fornia and graduating from the Normal he taught school for a time and soon began to interest himself in real estate investments. Bnying land, he developed a fruit ranch in Santa Cruz county and this was his real start in his chosen line of work. In 1903 he came to Tulare county from San Jose and bought in partnership with A. V. Taylor, of Hanford, a tract of four thousand acres at Angiola, which for one year he superintended and then sold ont his interest to Mr. Taylor and made his way to Porterville. He then bought a tract of three thousand aeres on the White river which he still owns and which is operated as a stock and dairy ranch. Mr. Sears is the present proprietor of the Sears Investment Co., with offices at No. 508 Main street, Porterville, and is well known in his community as a prosperous business man, who is an authority not alone on land, but on fruit growing and all their relative branches. He is a stockholder in the Porterville Co-operative Creamery Co. He has just moved his family into their fine residence on El Granito avenne, Porterville, which is one of the picture places of that city. Independent in his political views he has always refused any political honors and votes locally for the man he deems best suited for the office. In national affairs he unites with the Democratic party.
Mr. Sears was married JJanuary 1, 1888, to Miss Sara B. Loncks, of Contra Costa county, the daughter of the late Hon. George P. Loneks, who was for many years in political office in Contra Costa
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county. He was a leader in politics in the Republican party in South- ern California, where he was justly well and favorably known. For years he was a member of the Republican National Committee and of the State Central Committee. The eldest of Mr. and Mrs. Sears' four surviving children is George Arthur, now manager of the telegraphers in the K office of the Southern Pacific Railway at Bakersfield. By his marriage with Miss Abbie Gibbons of Porterville he has two children, Georgie and Eloise. William Allison, Jr., is at present manager of a drug store at Strathmore and is ummarried. Emma Pauline and Annie Belle are both at home. These children represent the tenth generation from their American ancestor, Richard Sears. In religion the family are Congregationalists and socially are well known and number their friends by the score.
Mr. Sears has the honor of being the first grower to open up. advertise and make known the orange lands south of Porterville under the new irrigation system for oranges, and his success has been such as to attract the attention of many who have those interests at heart. A very interesting article written by Mr. Sears on this subject and giving a detailed account of the beanties and advantages throughout the Earlimart Colony in that vicinity may be found in the July, 1906, issue of the magazine entitled Out West. He was one of the organizers of the Porterville Realty Board and Chamber of Commerce and has since been one of its influential members. He has found time from his active business life to organize the Improvement Club here and this has been since taken over by. the ladies of Porter- ville. Such a citizen merits the praise and earnest gratitude of his fellow-citizens, and Mr. Sears is fortunate in that he receives the esteem and confidence of all who know him and he holds an enviable place in the minds of many who have come to appreciate his excellent characteristics and his sagacious and well-informed mind.
FRED SAAHROLAN
This skillful farmer is well known and respected in the vicinity of Yettem, where he is enjoying prosperity as the result of well-directed effort. He was born November 25, 1884, and remained in his native Armenia until he was fourteen years old, then came to the United States with his father and at Philadelphia, Pa., ate his first turkey dinner, an experience which he will always remember. After a short stay there, he came to California and settled in Fresno county, where he lived seven years. He attended school for a time, farming and fruit-growing for wages and learning the work and the ways of the country.
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It was to Tulare county, where he has since lived. that Mr. Sahroian went from Fresno county in 1907. He soon bought twenty acres of land and later forty acres more, making a farm of sixty acres, which he has improved with a house, a barn and other necessary build- ings. He has forty-three acres under vines, seven acres bearing peaches and ten acres devoted to oranges. One year he sold twelve tons of Thompson seedlings from six acres; also eleven and one-half tons of Muscats, and forty-eight tons of. Zinfandels. His orange grove is young and his peach trees are just coming into bearing. As a citizen he has the good opinion of his neighbors, and fraternally he affiliates with the Yettem Banavalum club. Politically he is a Repub- lican. He married Victoria Meledonian in April, 1912.
Mr. Sahroian's parents, Melick and Elbis Sahroian, are members of his household. Of their six children he is one of the most helpful to them. His sister married James Dagdighian and lives at Selma, Fresno county. Mr. Sahroian, still loving his native land with true patriotism, is nevertheless thoroughly Americanized, and his aspira- tions are all for the future greatness of his adopted country. In many ways he has shown that he possesses a commendable public spirit and there is no local interest that does not have his encouragement and support.
. JOHN J. SCHUELLER
One of the most persistent and successful promoters of the devel- opment of Central California is John J. Schueller of No. 401 Sonth Bridge street, Visalia. Mr. Seheller was born in Prussia in 1844, and was brought to the United States by his family, which settled in She- boygan county, Wis. After leaving school he became a salesman of agricultural implements, in which capacity he traveled many years, winning much success and acquiring a wide acquaintance. In 1884 he bought land and settled down to farming and cattle, horse and hog breeding, besides giving considerable attention to grain, and eventually he allied himself successfully with the insurance business. Twenty years later. in 1904, on account of impaired health, he gave up the latter business and settled at Visalia. Tulare county, becoming the owner of one hundred and sixty acres of land northeast of town, so exceedingly rich and productive that in 1907 he marketed one hundred and eighty tons of hay eut from one hundred acres. This property is now operated by a tenant under lease. Mr. Schneller is the owner of valuable real estate on South Bridge street, Visalia, and being a man of much publie spirit he has from time to time participated promi- nently in movements for the benefit of the community. He is much
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interested in the development of Tulare county, and as a correspondent to German papers published in Wisconsin, has put many glowing ac- counts of local conditions and advantages before his countrymen in that state. This work he has followed up by writing letters to inquir- ers, setting forth the healthfulness of Tulare county's wonderful eli- mate and giving in detail some account of the opportunities here offered to home-seekers. As the result of his personal efforts forty- nine families of Germans have become permanent settlers in the county. He is the moving spirit also in German Lodge, California D. O. H., No. 693, which has a membership of one hundred and twenty- two Germans, all of whom are able to read and write the English lan- guage.
In 1872 Mr. Schneller married Miss Angusta Poppe, a native of Germany, and he has seven children and thirteen grandchildren. Fol- lowing are the names of his children: John P., Andrew, Herman, Casper, Joseph, Josephine and Clara. Josephine married Casper Schlaich, and Clara is the wife of A. L. Depute.
GEORGE H. TEAGUE
On the farm near Exeter, Tulare county, on which he now lives, George H. Teagne was born in 1877. He was educated at Exeter and at Visalia and was reared to familiarity with farm work. John Teague, his father, was born in Missouri and came with an ox-team to California more than forty years ago and settled on the ranch which is now the home of his son. The country was then new and not very productive and his greatest success was in raising stock. He married Susan Buckman, a native of Kentucky, who survives him, he having passed away in 1907 on the family homestead near Exeter.
After his father's death Mr. Teagne became associated with his mother in the conduct of the farming and stock raising enterprise which the elder Teagne had brought to such important proportions. They have seventeen hundred and thirty-five acres of land in the foothills, which is a cattle range. Besides the homestead, which con- sists of one hundred and fifty-three acres, they own one hundred and sixty acres one-half mile north which George H. and his brother Edward E. devote to stock raising. A man of publie spirit, Mr. Teague is in every way a worthy and useful citizen. In 1907 he mar- ried Miss Eva Wiley, a native of Iowa, whose parents had brought her to California. While he does not hold membership in any parlor of Native Sons of the Golden West, he is a native son of sunshiny Cali- fornia, proud of his birth within its borders and solicitous not only
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for its material advancement, but for the moral uplift of all its people of whatever class or condition.
OCTAVIUS H. WEBB
A native of the Old Dominion, Virginia, O. H. Webb, whose present postoffice address is Dinuba, Tulare county, Cal., was born in historie Fluvana county, January 27, 1857. His father, George H. Webb, a carpenter by trade, served under General Lee in the Civil war, from 1861 to the end of the struggle, and during the closing years of his service was detailed to the commissary department. He mar ried Martha Noel, who like himself was a native of Virginia, and they had three children.
In 1887 O. H. Webb came to California and since then has given all of his active years to ranching. He has bought town lots in Dinuba and built a residence near the high school. For one acre he paid $100 and for his other Dinnba lots $100 each. He leases forty acres of the Humphrey land and has five acres in orchard, the remainder in vine- yard, yielding an average crop of one ton per acre. Five acres he devotes to peaches, which yielded in 1911 one ton of dried fruit per acre at an average price of eight cents a pound.
In his youth Mr. Webb learned the carpenter's trade with his father, who was a contractor and builder, but he has not followed his trade since coming to California. Politically he has always affiliated with the Republicans. In Virginia he married Sallie Mahaynes, and they have a son, Horace L. Webb, who is married and has two children. Mrs. Webb died in May, 1887, deeply regretted by all who had known her. As a citizen Mr. Webb is public spirited to a noteworthy degree, taking a deep and abiding interest in all economic questions affecting the welfare of his community and state.
HARVEY L. WARD
December 28, 1851, Harvey L. Ward, son of Lewis and Mary (Harmon) Ward, was born in Shiawassee county, Mich. His father was a native of Vermont, his mother was born in the state of New York; they were the first couple married in the vicinity of their home and Mrs. Ward taught the first school there. Lewis Ward was a she- cessful farmer. In 1862 the family crossed the plains with horse- teams to California by way of Omaha, Salt Lake City and the Sink of the Humboldt, traversing the desert and arriving eventually at Placer-
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ville. They soon located at Mud Spring in Placer county and lived afterward at Bodega Corners, Sonoma county. In 1866 the family returned to Michigan, experiencing considerable delay at Greytown, where they had to wait for a vessel. For two years they lived near Clarence, Shiawassee county, Mich., maintaining themselves by farm- ing, and in 1868 they returned to California by practically the same ronte over which they had come ont before, except that they crossed the river at North Platte, taking their wagons across on hand-cars and swimming their stock, which they effected successfully, while others, who paid $200 to have their stock taken over, lost some of it. On the way they saw many graves marked "Killed by Indians." After a short stop at Sacramento they went on to Bodega Corners, where Mr. Ward operated a hotel, meanwhile becoming owner of a farm in Green Valley.
In 1877 Mr. Ward came to Stokes Mountain and in 1880 he mar- ried, in the Wilson district, Miss Martha E. West, a daughter of ('ali- fornia, whose parents had come across the plains in 1849. Her father, Morris M. West, a native of Kentucky, had lived some time in Mis- souri, whence he came to California, partially by the Platte route. His cattle gave out on the way and he made a trade by which he had a better ontfit than that with which he started from Missouri. After living for a time in Antter county, he moved to San Jose, whence he came to Tulare county, later locating in the Wilson district. Mr. and Mrs. Ward have had four children, Phoebe G., Arthur T., Henry H., and Stella. The last-mentioned has passed away. Henry II. mar- ried Mabel Allen, a native of California, and she has borne him a son, Allen Ward. Phoebe G. has distinguished herself in the high school at Visalia. Mr. Ward, most of whose schooling was obtained in the public school at Bodega Corners, Sonoma county, was determined to give his children the best education at his command. In 1892 he bonght ten acres, where he now lives, two miles north of Orosi. That land was then mostly under vines. He has since been an extensive purchaser of land and now devotes twenty-two acres to vineyards, growing Muscat grapes and a few Sultanas. He has five hundred acres on Sand Creek devoted to pasturage, with two hundred acres of woodland adjoining. He also owns one hundred and twenty acres in the Baker Valley. Giving considerable attention to stock, he is espe- cially interested in his fruit trees and vines. In a single year he has raised thirty-two tons of raisins and he has several thousand cords of wood on his property. When he came to this locality, where he and his brother, I. T. Ward, were among the earliest wheat growers, wild game was plentiful and he has killed many deer and antelope as well as bear, mountain lions and foxes. Ile was interested in teaming to the mountains 1877-99 and freighting to the mines in Tuolumne county 1888-1900. His recollections of the past are most interesting. Politi-
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cally Mr. Ward is an independent Republican. He and his family are communicants of the Christian church.
WILLIAM A. WILLIAMS
In Queens county, N. Y., part of Long Island, in the old town of Jericho. William A. Williams was born January 1, 1840, a son of George and Mercy Williams, both of whom were natives of Hyde Park, London, England. When he was six years old his family removed to Mill Neck, N. Y., whence they went to Hempstead, Long Island. After two years' residence there they moved to a place four and a half miles west of Hoboken, N. J., near the Hudson river, and there lived for quite a number of years. The father was an industrious teamster and farmer, and there were nine children in the family. On July 30, 1862, William A. Williams enlisted as a private in Company K, Eleventh Regiment, New Jersey Volunteer Infantry, and later saw some of the most hazardous service of the Civil war. At Chan- cellorsville, his first battle, of five hundred men detailed for a certain duty, eighteen were killed, one hundred and forty-six wounded and five missing. On the second day of the fight at Gettysburg seventeen men of his regiment were killed, one hundred and twenty-four wounded and twelve missing. The Eleventh New Jersey was included in Humph- rey's division of the Third Army Corps, being afterwards transferred to the Second Corps under General Hancock. Mr. Williams took part in twelve battles and in a large number of skirmishes, among them the second Chancellorsville, Battle of Wilderness, Spottsylvania and Cold Harbor. In his last general engagement he was wounded in the head by a Confederate sharpshooter and sent to the hospital, and in the course of events he was discharged from the service for disability, March 11. 1865, about a month before the collapse of the Southern Confederacy.
Returning to New Jersey, September, 1865, Mr. Williams mar- ried Josephine L. Williams, in June, 1866, and she bore him four chil- dren, Gertrude, Clark V., Josephine and one daughter, deceased. After his marriage, he lived three years in Adams county, Wis., where he devoted himself to farming and hop-raising. In 1870 he home- steaded land in Kansas, where during a time of privation he and his family lived on buffalo meat and artichokes, for the cooking of which there was no fuel but buffalo chips. It was necessary for them to haul their provisions one hundred and fifty miles, from Waterville and Marysville. The great grasshopper year, 1874, Mr. Williams will never forget. One of his neighbors had his grain in shock and he helped him to thresh his wheat. The man declared that he would eut
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his corn as soon as the first grasshopper would appear, but the pests came in such numbers that they ate ten acres of corn before he could do anything to prevent them, and after having vainly attacked them with rollers, he and his wife were obliged to burn the prairie to kill them. From 1880 to 1906 he lived in various places in Colorado and South Dakota. In October of the year last mentioned he bought forty acres in Tulare county at $40 an acre. Previously he had owned land in the Owens river valley, which he sold to the city of Los Angeles. His forty-acre tract in Tulare county was unimproved, but he has since built a house, a barn and other necessary buildings on the property and is making a specialty of the cultivation of Muscat grapes.
Associations of the days of the Civil war are maintained by Mr. Williams in a way by his membership in the Grand Army of the Re- public and he receives a government pension of $24. He was a charter member of General Shafter Post No. 191, G. A. R., of Dinuba. Politi- cally he is a Republican. As a citizen he is public-spirited and helpful to all good interests of the community. Dear to him as are the mem- ories of his youth and of the Civil war period, the recollections of his days of overland travel, in the period 1870-85, are no less fondly cher- ished. They picture to him the old road to Kansas and to Colorado, glimpses of Greeley and Fort Collins and of other wayside places and of Miller, S. Dak. Those days under the white-topped prairie schooner were days of discomfort, but they were days of hopes that after a time were fully realized. Mrs. Williams died in 1887 at her home in Mis- souri Hot Springs, whither she had gone on a visit and for her health while her husband was getting settled in his new location.
WILLIAM ALFORD
One of the native sons of California who are winning success in Tulare county is William Alford, who is farming and dairying eight miles north of Exeter on rural free delivery route No. 1. Mr. Alford was born in Plumas county in 1862 and began attending school near his childhood home. When he was twelve years old he was brought by his family to Tulare county, where he completed his education and where he has lived continuously to this time except during three or four years. His father, who was a native of Virginia, was a promi- nent farmer and an active promoter of irrigation who had much to do with the construction of early ditches in the county. His mother, also a native of the Old Dominion, was a woman of the finest character, who influence has been a beneficent force in her son's life. They came to California among the pioneers, as long ago as 1853, and passed to their reward many years ago. Mr. Alford has been familiar with the
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work of the farm sinee his childhood, having been early instructed in it by his father. When he came to Tulare county the country was new, settlements were sparse and improvements were few and primitive. Ile has been permitted not only to witness but to participate in its de- velopment into one of the most productive districts of a state of won- derful resources.
In 1882 Mr. Alford bought forty acres of land and in 1907 one hun- dred and sixty aeres more, constituting a farm of two hundred aeres, which he devotes to farming, dairying and stock-raising, keeping about twenty cows the year round. His career has been snecessful from every point of view, for while he has prospered financially he has won the respect of his fellow-citizens by an exhibition of public spirit that has made him most helpful to all worthy local interests. His reminiscences, conld they be given in full, would be most interest- ing as a contribution to the history of the county. He knew the pioneers and has known all the prominent men of a later day. At the time of the lamentable Mussel Slongh fight, so-called, he was within a half a mile of the scene of action.
In 1890 Mr. Alford married Miss Mary Etta Mason, a native of California and a daughter of a pioneer freighter in this part of the country, and she has borne him twelve children, all of whom survive. Mr. Alford's interest in education has impelled him to accept the office of school trustee, which he has filled greatly to the advantage of the schools and his neighborhood.
JAMES ALLEN BACON
In St. Louis county, Mo., James Allen Bacon was born November 19, 1838, the eldest of the eight children of William Bacon, six of whom survive. The father was born in Kentucky in January, 1800, a son of Nathaniel Bacon, who located in St. Louis county, Mo., after the war of 1812. There William lived until 1849, when he started with his family to Texas. In Crawford county, Ark., they were detained by illness and there he bought a farm on which he lived until 1859, when he set out for California with his wife, four daughters and three sons. They came by El Paso and stopped for a while at Tueson, Ariz. Later they completed the journey to California by way of Yuma to Los Angeles and the Tejon Pass to Tulare county. They crossed the Colorado river at Ft. Fillmore and soon met Indians who run off their cattle; but followed two of them who had the cattle in charge and rescued the animals. Ten miles northeast of Visalia on the Kaweah, Mr. Bacon bought a farm, and in 1868 he took up one hundred and sixty acres, now the site of Orosi, where he was a pioneer settler. James
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A. Bacon hauled Inmber from the mountains and with help of hired men built the first house there, which is yet standing. The family afterward removed to Visalia, where the father died, aged eighty-one years. The mother, Mrs. Permelia Bacon, a native of St. Louis county, Mo., died in Fresno county in her seventy-ninth year. The sons of the family are James Allen; Thomas, of Fresno; Charles F., of Hol- lister; and William, of Phoenix, Ariz. The daughters are Missonri A. Kirkland, of Arizona; Elizabeth Campbell, of Sultana; Mary Smoot, of Cochran ; and Martha Morris, of Orroyo Grande.
When he was ten years old James Allen Bacon accompanied his parents to Arkansas, where he was educated in a log school house. He drove a team to Tucson, Ariz., and remained there a year, driving a stage for Butterfield over a ronte east from Tucson some eighty miles, changing horses every ten hours at stations twenty miles apart. While thus employed he was twice attacked by Indians, but was saved by his swift horses. One of the red-skinned parties was in war paint. At another time his presence of mind enabled him to save his own life and that of his passengers as well. When he made his last trip as stage driver, Indians formed in line across the road and demanded whisky and tobacco. The passengers handed out their bottles, and while the Indians were drinking Mr. Bacon put whip to the horses and soon had the whole party out of danger.
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