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 79
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 79
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83 | Part 84
Mr. Bacon's observations and experience would be interesting conld they be given in full. He told of having seen a monument on the east border of Tulare county which was erected by General Scott in the early '50s. He was acquainted with the Dalton brothers, with Sontag and Evans and with James McKinney, and saw James McCreary hanged at Visalia. He said the condemned man had said he would never die with his boots on and pulled them off before going to the gallows. Mr. Bacon built a dwelling in the Orosi district, between Centerville and Visalia. He rode back and forth in all directions over this country before there was any fruit or grain raised here. He homesteaded one hundred and sixty acres of land east of Visalia and bonght some railroad land. After he had gone into the sheep busi- ness, he met a inan from Visalia to whom he traded for a horse a claim to one hundred and sixty acres of land where Orosi now stands, which is worth now $500 an acre. In the period 1860 to 1870 he saw thon- sands of antelope and will horses and many Indians, and on Fish slongh and other swamps saw many elk. Bear were plentiful on the plains and many of them were killed for meat. Mr. Bacon himself killed fifty bears and was in many a desperate bear fight.
The Bacon family came on to California in 1859 and for a time James was employed by his uncle, James Fielding Bacon, in the stock business. In that same year he went to the mines at Princeton, in Mariposa county. After having been emplove ! five years there, at
832
TULARE AND KINGS COUNTIES
Marysville and elsewhere, he went to Orosi and built his father's house. Later he again helped his uncle for many years in hog and stock-raising. Ile also found Inerative employment in driving stock to the southern mines. After the organization of the California Raisin Growers' Association he was active in its development.
On October 17, 1880, in Tulare county, Mr. Bacon married Sarah Edmiston, a native of Calaveras county, and a daughter of N. B. Edmiston. The family home was at Orosi after January, 1889. Mr. Bacon died July 3, 1912, in Fresno. His wife passed away, in her forty-seventh year, March 17, 1901. She was a member of the Meth- odist Episcopal church. Following are the names of five children who survive: Alice Mand, married William Mackersie, of Dinuba, and has two sons, Gerald Edward and William Kenneth; Thomas Allen, of Dinuba, married Cora Tracy and has one son, James Emerson; Edith Theodate married R. J. Reed and has one son, John Allen; Jessie Ethel is the wife of Jesse Furtney; and Elsie Viola. In his political affiliations Mr. Bacon was a Democrat, and was a member of the county central committee and was also elected and served two terms as a school trustee. As a man of public spirit he always took a helpful interest in the community.
GEORGE EDWARD ALLEN
Near Lena, in Stephenson county, Ill., George Edward Allen was born January 27, 1850, a son of James Allen, who was born in Canada andI died in Illinois in 1855. The widow remarried two years later and died in Illinois also. For a short time George E. Allen attended the common school and when abont twelve years old became self-support- ing. In 1869 he went to Knox county, Ill., and there followed coal mining for five years, at that time moving to Iowa and farming in Polk and Jasper counties. From there he went to Turner county. S. Dak., in 1883. and in July, that year, the crops were destroyed by a hail storm. After four years in Dakota, some of which were not as strennous as the first one, Mr. Allen came to Tulare county, Cal., set- tling on White river, and for eighteen years harvested crops of wheat that ranged from one-half a sack to six sacks an acre and sold at sixty-eight cents to $1.47 a hundred pounds. He located on his present homestead in 1906, when he bought forty acres of unimproved land, four acres of which are now in Marshall strawberries and two acres in orange nursery trees of one season's growth. His strawberry plants are bearing fairly well and in a recent season he sold eleven thousand baskets at an average price of seven cents a basket. His Muscat grapes are just beginning to bear. He has fourteen acres of them, intends
833
TULARE AND KINGS COUNTIES
soon to set eleven acres to orange trees, and now has eight acres in peach trees just bearing.
Mr. Allen married in 1870 Margaret Morgan, in Knox county, Ill., and has two children living, Mabel B. and William M. One dangh- ter, Jennie, died in childhood in Dakota. Mabel B. married Henry Ward, of Tulare county, and they have a son named Allen Ward. In political affiliations Mr. Allen is Republican, thoroughly devoted to the principles of his party, and as a citizen he is public-spirited to a degree that insures his usefulness to the community.
JOHN WALTON BOZEMAN
In Hinds county, Miss., August 31, 1836, was born John Walton Bozeman, who has lived in Tulare connty abont as long as any surviv- ing pioneer. His grandfather, Howell Bozeman, built the first state house, at Milledgeville, Ga., and eventually moved to Mississippi, accompanied by members of his family and others. Thomas Jefferson Bozeman, who was John Walton's father, remained in Hinds county, Miss., until after his son was born and he left his wife Rachel Par- ker, buried there. In 1842 the family moved to Louisiana, where the father married Miss Eliza Ford, of which nnion two children, William and Mary Near, survive. In 1849 they settled in Texas and in 1854 crossed the plains in a party with ox-team outfits to California, where he became engaged in farming on Kings river and mining in Mari- posa and Kern counties, putting up the first tent on Poso creek flats, where he mined, kept a boarding house, and did freighting.
J. W. Bozeman's recollections of that cross-country trip would be interesting reading could they all be put into print. He helped to bury the bodies of members of the Oatman family, who had been mur- dered by Indians on their way from Texas to California. Two of the Oatman children were captured by the savages and one of them was rescued later by friends. Usually emigrants were safe so long as goodly numbers of them kept together, but there was great peril for any who became separated from their trains.
It was when he was about eighteen years old that Mr. Bozeman arrived in California, passing through Tulare county along the immi- grant trail, and on October 12, 1854, they stopped on Kings river. ITis opportunities for education had been very limited, as almost from childhood he had ridden after cattle or worked in the cotton field. In 1864, in San Bernardino county, he married Miss Susan Hendrey, born January 16, 1842, in Indiana, daughter of Isaac Hendrey, who was a pioneer of Oregon. He was a descendant of old Irish families and his wife was Miss Mary White of Indiana. Mrs. Bozeman passed 48
834
TULARE AND KINGS COUNTIES
away in Kings county in 1898, while the family were living near Han- ford. She was the mother of a large family of children, all natives of California, eight of whom grew to maturity and married, viz. : Preston Leander, of Exeter; Julia A., married to L. H. Byron, of Lemoore; Armazila U., wife of E. C. Nowlan, of Exeter; Jesse D., of Hanford; Melissa A., wife of J. Bloomhall, of Alhambra; John W., of Fresno; Hattie, married to Warren Hawley, of Lindsay; and Rachel, wife of Ralph Berridge, of Porterville. Three children died in infaney, and Chester W. passed away in early childhood. The father of Mrs. Boze- man lived to the age of ninety-six years, and one of his daughters, Mrs. Cleghorn, now lives at Highlands, San Bernardino county. Two of his sons are making their home at the Soldiers' Home at Engene, Oregon.
After his marriage Mr. Bozeman went into the sheep business and was successful for about twenty years, keeping most of the time abont ten thousand head. He became the owner of three hundred acres of land on Kings river, where he settled in 1854, with his father, and later rented large tracts on which he sowed grain. His last wheat erop was garnered from thirty-five hundred acres. He disposed of all his holdings in Kings county and lives with his children, and has been a resident of Porterville since January, 1911. He has always been an active, influential and publie-spirited citizen.
MARTIN WIRHT
In that wonderful European republic, Switzerland, Martin Wirht, who now lives a mile and a quarter northwest of Exeter, Tulare county. Cal., was born in 1857. When he was eleven years old he came to the United States and made his way to Springfield, Ill., where he lived a year, and from that time until 1879 his home was in Missouri. He went from Missouri to Kansas, from Kansas to Wyoming, and then back to Kansas, and in 1896 from Kansas to California, living six years in Wyoming and six years in Kansas.
In Tulare county Mr. Wirht's first place of residence was Porter- ville, from which town he moved to his present home near Exeter, where he has fifteen acres bearing oranges, five acres under grape- vines and twenty-five arres on which he grows vines and trees. Ilis navel oranges are of fine variety and are usually among the earliest in his vicinity to reach the market. When he took the ranch in hand it was raw and without improvements, but he has provided it with a house and other buildings and developed it into one of the best home- steads in the Exeter district.
The marriage of Martin Wirht and Eliza Meredith, a native of
1
-
1
-- - --
835
TULARE AND KINGS COUNTIES
Missouri, has resulted in the birth of five children, all of whom were educated or are being educated in Tulare county. Their oldest daughter is married. The parents of both Mr. and Mrs. Wirht have passed away. Mr. Wirht is regarded as a self-made man who richly deserves the success that he has won. He has always been too busy to take up political work and is not ambitious for office, but he is publie-spiritedly helpful to all worthy interests of the community.
RICHARD BURKE
This is the life story of a man whose activities were begun as a drummer boy in the Federal army in the Civil war. Born in Clay county, III., July 5, 1849, he was only about twelve years old when the war began. He enlisted at Louisville, Ill., December 21, 1863, in Com- pany K, Forty-eighth Regiment, Illinois Volunteer Infantry, which was attached to the Third Brigade, Second Division, Fifteenth Army Corps, with which the name of Gen. John A. Logan is identified. The first fight in which he participated was that of Buzzard's Roost, at Resaca, Ga. From that time on until the end of the war he took part in many hotly contested engagements of greater or less importance, participating in Sherman's march to the sea; his more immediate com- manding generals being successively Harland, Hazen, Oliver and Rice. It was not long after his service began that he became a soldier in active duty. He was discharged August 15, 1865, and mustered out at Springfield.
Returning to Clay county, Ill., Mr. Burke remained there until April 20, 1870, when he started for California, arriving in Stockton, Cal., May 1, that year. He then came to Tulare county and remained until April, 1872, when he located in Squaw Valley, homesteading one hundred and sixty acres of land which he has improved and on which he now lives. By subsequent purchase he has come to own three hundred and fifty-two acres. He farms about one hundred acres, the rest of his land being under pasture and timber, and keeps about one hundred head of stock.
On August 5, 1868, in Louisville, III., Mr. Burke married Miss Mary R. Drake, a native of Ohio. Her parents, also of Ohio birth, came to California in 1870, being members of Mr. Burke's party. They found the country very new and were obliged to go thirty-five miles for their mail, which they got at Visalia. They paid eighteen cents a pound for brown sugar by the half barrel, and other things in proportion. Children as follows were born to Mr. and Mrs. Burke. Anna G., Floy I., Elva Lewis, Almeda J., John W., Harry A., Oliver M., Viola L., and Harold R. Anna G. married C. C. Traweek. Floy I.
836
TULARE AND KINGS COUNTIES
is Mrs. W. A. Hampton. Elva Lewis is the wife of L. B. Holcombe. Almeda J. is the wife of Harlan MeIntire. John W. married Miss Jean Lawresten, formerly a teacher. Harry A. married Myrtle M. Akers. Oliver M. married Irene Fleming, who was a teacher. Viola L. mar- ried T. R. Byrd. Harold R. is a graduate of Heald's Business College of Fresno and is employed in that city. Mr. and Mrs. Burke have thirteen grandchildren.
In his polities Mr. Burke is Republican. He is a member of At- lanta Post, G. A. R., at Fresno.
A. M. DREISBACH
At Tiffin, Ohio, April 20, 1852, was born A. M. Dreisbach, who is now a farmer and a minister of the United Brethren church at Exeter, Tulare county, Cal. His father, a native of Pennsylvania, came to Ohio in his youth; he married a daughter of a German, and died in 1876. Mr. Dreisbach's mother has been dead many years.
A. M. Dreisbach remained at Tiffin until he was twenty-five years old, and there he seenred a primary education which he supplemented by a course at the Eastman Business College at Poughkeepsie, N. Y. He had just completed his studies at that institution when he was re- called to his home by the death of his father. His earlier labors were all on the ranch, but eventually he entered the ministry. From his old home in Ohio he went to Kansas, and a year later went up into Iowa. From there he returned to Kansas, and he went thence to Utah. About eighteen years ago he came to California and settled at Exeter, where he now has a beautiful ranch of twenty-five aeres, his principal crop being oranges. This property he has acquired by industry and econ- omy and those other personal qualities which are the fundamentals of the success of the self-made man.
In 1878 Mr. Dreisbach married Miss Elizabeth Bollinger of Ne- braska, who has borne her husband eight children, three of whom. Clara, John Wesley and Hattie, have died since the family came to California. The others are Minnie, Nellie, Harvey, Grace and Roy. The latter is a student in the high school at Exeter. Minnie married Rev. J. L. Hanson in 1909; he is pastor of the Methodist Episcopal ('Imreh Sonth at LeGrand, Cal. They have one child, Margaret. Nellie married T. W. Harvey, a furniture dealer at Los Angeles. The others are at home. Mr. Dreisbach is patriotic and public-spirited. interested in the political issues of the day, especially solicitons for the cause of temperance. He has held public office, but he does not affiliate with any secret order.
837
TULARE AND KINGS COUNTIES
SAMUEL LAVERNE KENNEY
Back in Tennessee in Greene county, Samnel Laverne Kenney, who now lives three miles southeast of Orosi, in Tulare county, Cal., first saw the light of day in the year 1863. He lived there with his parents until he was seven years old, then the family moved to Mis- souri and located in Pineville, McDonald county, where the elder Ken- ney farmed sixteen years. It was in 1886 that Samuel L. came to Tulare county, within the borders of which he has since had his home, in the Alta district. The country round about was then a vast wheat- field. without trees or fences, and stock roamed at will in the swamps and hills. He now has on his homestead eighty acres of fine land, eighteen acres of which are in Malaga grapes, ten in peaches, ten in miscellaneous orchard trees, and the balance under pasture. His vineyard and orchard are just coming into bearing. He keeps enough horses to work his ranch and raises a few hogs each year. He has a four-year-old grove of eucalyptus trees.
The parents of Mr. Kenney were James D. and Nancy (Goodin) Kenney, natives of Tennessee. The mother died in Missouri and Mr. Kenney came to Tulare county in 1901, where he passed away in De- cember, 1912. They had children named Ebie, Wroten, Bruce R., Samuel L., Callie, and Ida. Bruce R. married Lotta Scott, who hore him three children, Ralph, Laverne, and Goldie. With the exception of Samuel L. and Ida the others have passed away.
As a citizen Mr. Kenney has many times and in many ways dem- onstrated his public spirit by lending generous aid to movements for the uplift and development of the community. Politically he is a So- cialist.
JOSIAH M. FERGUSON
A long and useful career which has figured prominently in national as well as civic affairs has identified Josiah M. Ferguson as one of the most valued citizens of his country and his service in the Civil war supplemented by active participation in the development of Tulare county has marked him a stanch patriot. In the state of Georgia, in the heart of the Sunny South. Josiah M. Ferguson was born March 25. 1843, son of Champion and Rachel (Dackett) Ferguson, the former an old Georgia planter, and a native of Kentucky, his wife being a native of Georgia.
Josiah M. Ferguson was reared and educated in his native place and learned much about the cultivation of the soil. In 1863 he made his way through the mountains and enlisted in Company G, Tenth
838
TULARE AND KINGS COUNTIES
Tennessee Cavalry, serving in that company until he received his dis- charge. Soon after the war he removed to Tennessee, and there, October 20, 1872, he married Miss Parthenia C. Cundiff, a native of that state. From Tennessee, in 1875, they came to Tulare county, Cal., and homesteaded one hundred and sixty acres of land which Mr. Fer- guson developed into a good farm, on which he lived until 1904, when he moved to Porterville, and passed away in 1909. He helped to establish the postoffice at Poplar and served as postmaster one year. lle was a man of public spirit, ready at all times to do anything in his power for the advancement of the interests of his fellow-citizens whom he held in warm affection as friends and neighbors. He aided in building the Poplar ditch, ran the first water, and was president of the company. Fraternally he affiliated with the Masons and was a men- ber of the G. A. R. He was a Republican in polities.
The parents of Mrs. Ferguson were Thomas and Mary (Grass) Cundiff, natives of Virginia and descended from old and honorable Southern families. She bore her husband eight children, three of them native sons and four native daughters of California. All of them sur- vive except James, who was drowned at Oakland in 1901. Cordelia, the eldest, born in Tennessee, was nine months old when her parents came to California. She married Fletcher Martin and is living in Tu- Iare county. The others were Dora, Mrs. George Futrell, and Cora, Mrs. William Walker (twins), Mary, wife of Arthur Hayes. Tennia, married to Ernest Ridgeway, James, Thomas and Fletcher. The two last mentioned are in business at Porterville, Cal. Mrs. Ferguson has five grandsons and five granddaughters. She owns a half-section of fine land near Poplar, which was their old homestead. A woman of strong character, whose good influence is manifested in the lives of her children, she is fortunate in being able to pass her declining years in association with friends who honor her for her sake and for her hus- band's and regard her with gratitude for many kindnesses which she has rendered them.
MARTIN CLICK
Descended in the paternal line from old families of Germany. where his father, Peter (liek, was born, "Mart" Click, who lives ten miles west of Porterville, Tulare county, is a native of Stark county, Ohio, where he opened his eyes to the world June 18, 1844. He spent his boyhood and youth in attending public schools and helping his father on the farm. In 1864, when he was twenty years old, he came to California. Stopping in Placer county, he worked for wages six years for B. C. Trefry, with whom he came to Merced county in 1870
839
TULARE AND KINGS COUNTIES
and bought a band of sheep, numbering about nine hundred head. They remained partners and stayed there until 1874, when they sold ont and came to Tulare county and again bought four thousand sheep on the plains. In 1881 Mr. Click bought his partner's interest, since which time he has been engaged independently. In 1877, the year known to sheep men as the "hard year," he had ten thousand head, all of which he lost except about two thousand, by which misfortune he was brought to practical ruin. In 1886, selling his sheep, he bought three hundred and twenty acres of land near Woodville and engaged in raising grain, cattle, horses and sheep, in which business he has continued up to the present time with a degree of success that has done much to make him forget his troubles of the past. His home has been on this ranch since that date, and he has witnessed the devel- opment of the county, in which he has been a participant.
In 1883 Mr. Click married Miss Hope Broughtan, a native of Pennsylvania. She has borne him a son, Roy Click, who was educated at Stanford University, and who married Miss Nellie Stockton, they residing with Mr. and Mrs. Click. Mr. Click, while entertaining pro- nounced opinions on all political and economic questions, has never accepted any ol'ce, but he is not withont influence among his towns- men, who honor him as a pioneer, remembering that when he came to Tulare county it and the territory in all directions was wild, open country where any man could feed sheep at will. When he went to Porterville there were only two stores there. Bear and deer were plentiful in the country round about and he often saw cattle come eight to ten miles for water. He has grown up with the country, whose development he has encouraged in many public-spirited ways.
JOHN BACON
A native of Pennsylvania, John Bacon went to the old frontier in Ohio when he was a small child. Thence he later emigrated to Missouri, and from Missouri he crossed the plains with ox-teams, in 1859. and made his way to the mines in Amador county, where he sought gold for a few months. In 1860 he came to Tulare county and engaged in cattle raising. Later he took up government land near Tulare city and still later he owned a ranch east of Visalia, where he lived the closing years of his life and passed away August 18, 1911, aged eighty-nine years. He married Margaret Hall, a native of Canada, and she bore him six children. Catherine, who was the third in order of birth of the family, became the wife of B. S. Vehic in 1901. lle is a native of New York state, who came to California in 1892 and went into the insurance business at Tulare. Ile came to Visalia in
840
TULARE AND KINGS COUNTIES
1904 and established an insurance and real estate business here, which he manages while looking after his twenty-acre ranch on East Mineral King avenue, ten acres of which is producing peaches. Mrs. Velie has an old chest, a bed quilt, some german-silver spoons and other valuable articles which her father brought across the plains with him and which she prizes highly. The members of the family in order of birth are : Mrs. George W. Dailey ; James; Mrs. B. S. Velie; Alexander; Mrs. Levi Mathewson; Mrs. G. B. Ralph, and Mrs. A. J. Teague. All are residents of Tulare county with the exception of Mrs. G. B. Ralph. who resides in Stockton, C'al.
WILLIAM FINDLEY
On the Siberian river, Texas, William Findley was born February 22, Washington's Birthday, 1851. When he was six years old his par- ents, John and Sarah J. (Masters) Findley, natives respectively of Missouri and Texas, brought him across the plains to California. The family was included in a party which came with ox-teams and had fre- quent trouble with Indians on the way. The savages often attempted to stampede or run off their cattle, and even when they were driven away they managed to kill the animals. At times the emigrants, under protection of wagon stockades, fonght long battles with their red- skinned foes, whose flintlock guns laid many a white man low. Ten of the party were killed by the Indians and Mr. Findley's sister Martha died on the way out. The family came to Hackby Ford in 1858 and started in the cattle business, locating in Tulare later in that year. In August, 1871, the grandfather, John Findley, who was the owner of two square miles of land in Drum Valley, was called to the door of his honse by robbers, who demanded his money, evidently believing that he had considerable of it on hand. His wife died in 1900.
About 1907 William Findley located on his present homestead, where he has one hundred and thirty-three acres of grain and pasture land, a garden and about two thousand cords of wood in the tree. He keeps forty-five to fifty head of cattle and about half as many hogs. The elder Findley and his son are Democrats and their fellow citizens recognize them as men of public spirit.
February 22, 1868, his birthday, Mr. Findley married, in the Sand ('reek neighborhood, Miss Ellen Woodey, who has borne him ten chil- dren. John M. married Martha Dean and has four children, Blanche, C'ecil, Gerald, and Inez. William J. married Mrs. Ida Strong, a dangh- ter of Stephen Gaster, at one time treasurer of Fresno county. Ivan married Susan Collier and their children are Aaron, Byron and Myrtle. Lee married Minnie Robinson and their children are Earl, Oswald and
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.