Montana, its story and biography; a history of aboriginal and territorial Montana and three decades of statehood, Volume II, Part 105

Author: Stout, Tom, 1879- ed
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: Chicago, American Historical Society
Number of Pages: 1126

USA > Montana > Montana, its story and biography; a history of aboriginal and territorial Montana and three decades of statehood, Volume II > Part 105

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Mr. Clifford was born at Weston in Platte County, Missouri, April 13, 1862. His father, Jeremiah Clif- ford, was born in County Kerry, Ireland, in 1835, and came to the United States in 1856. He im- mediately went to what was then the western frontier of Western Missouri, and for a number of years was a railroad man. He died at Atchison, Kansas, July 29, 1891. He was a democrat and Catholic and member of the Catholic Knights of America. He married Johanna Foley at Jefferson City, Missouri, in 1857. She was born in County Kerry, Ireland, in 1839, and died at Kansas City, Missouri, March 26, IQI0. The oldest of their children, D. J. Clifford, died at Jefferson City, Mis- souri, in 1908, where he was serving as deputy state dairy inspector. W. J. Clifford died at Kansas City, Missouri, March 4, 1918, having been connected with a wholesale house in that city. John E. Clifford is the third in the family. M. E. Clifford is with Smith, McCord & Company, a dry goods house in Kansas City. Mary was married in Atchison, Kan- sas, to Michael Sullivan, and they now live in Jack- sonville, Florida. Kate and Leona are both unmar-

ried and living at Kansas City, the latter being head bookkeeper for Peck's wholesale dry goods house, the largest firm of its kind in Kansas City.

John E. Clifford was educated in the grammar and high schools of Platte City, Missouri, and in 1882 graduated from St. Mary's College in Pottawa- tomie County, Kansas. From 1882 to 1886 he filled several clerical positions in the Missouri Pacific Railway offices at Atchison, Kansas, working up to the grade of chief clerk.

He left the Middle West in 1886 and arrived at Missoula, Montana, July 13, 1886. Until September I, 1887, he worked as shipping clerk for the Missou- la Mercantile Company. He accepted a proposition from T. J. DeMers to take charge of a large stock of goods into the Indian country at the head of navigation in the Flathead district, then Missoula County, now Flathead County. He housed his mer- chandise in a large tent. In 1888 Mr. Clifford laid out and platted the Town of De Mersville, Montana, a community now extinct, but which in its time was the scene of much history-making in that part of the state. Mr. Clifford was in that district when the trouble arose between the Government and the Flat- head Indians and had many experiences out on the border. In 1891 he was elected mayor of De Mers- ville, being the first and only mayor of that short- lived town. In 1892 the City of Kalispell was start- ed, and soon drew all the population away from De Mersville. In the meantime, in 1888, Mr. Clifford had been appointed postmaster at his store under President Cleveland, and the postoffice was named Clifford in his honor. He filled that office two years. He was then deputy United States marshal, and in that capacity had an official relation with some of the Indian troubles in his district.

In 1894 Mr. Clifford accompanied the United States Commission to Alaska to determine the boundary lines between that territory and Can- ada. Returning to Montana in 1895, he spent several years in Missoula and Butte, and in 1901 came to Anaconda, where he was employed in the smelters of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company until 1908. For 11/2 years, three terms of six months each, he was recording secretary for the Anaconda Mill and Smeltermen's Union. Mr. Clifford was appointed deputy game warden in 1909 by Governor Norris, holding that office four years. The office of state parole commissioner was created by the Legislature in 1913, and Governor Stewart chose Mr. Clifford as the man best qualified to initiate the duties of that office. After four years in 1917, he was reappointed for a second term.

Mr. Clifford has long been prominent in demo- cratic politics. For six years he was state commit- teeman of Deer Lodge County, for sixteen years has been a member of the Deer Lodge central com- mittee, and was secretary of the county central com- mittee two years. He has been a trustee of the Hearst Free Public Library at Anaconda for the past twelve years. He holds one of the oldest union cards in Anaconda, and is still a member of the Anaconda Mill and Smeltermen's Union.

Mr. Clifford is a Catholic, affiliated with Mount Haggin Court No. 629, Catholic Order of Foresters, with Anaconda Camp No. 154, Woodmen of the World, with the Knights and Ladies of Security, with Anaconda Aerie No. 18, Fraternal Order of Eagles, and with Anaconda Lodge No. 557, Loyal Order of Moose.

Mr. Clifford and family reside at 411 Pine Street. On December 24, 1887, at Frenchtown, Montana, he married Miss Della De Mers, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. T. J. De Mers, now deceased. Her father was a famous Montanan, a pioneer trader in general

2.6. Clifford

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merchandise, and became widely known all over the Northwest. Mrs. Clifford died in Oregon in 1901, the mother of one son. This son, Jerry J., was born at Clifford or De Mersville, Montana, October 14, 1890, and graduated from the Catholic High School at St. Joseph, Missouri. In 1917 he volunteered in the army, was trained as an aviator, arrived in Lon- don April 2, 1918, and was in France during the great events of the summer of 1918 and afterwards was with the Army of Occupation. He returned to this country, landing at New York City, July 13, 1919. On June 22, 1904, at Anaconda, Mr. Clifford married Mrs. Nellie M. (Whiston) Ahearn, daugh- ter of Mr. and Mrs. Patrick Whiston, who still live at Anaconda. Her father was an early settler at Anaconda and for thirty years has been connected with the A. C. M. Company. Mr. and Mrs. Clif- ford have two children : Theresa, born July 31, 1905. and James P., born April 29, 1908. By her first husband Mrs. Clifford has two children: Margaret, born April 17, 1899, and Mollie, born September 22, 1900. Margaret is a graduate of the Catholic High School at Anaconda with the class of 1916, and is now bookkeeper and stenographer for Duncan R. Mc- Rae's department store at Anaconda. Mollie, who graduated also in 1916, from St. Peter's Catholic High School at Anaconda, is said to be one of the most efficient and rapid stenographers in Montana. She is stenographer and bookkeeper for the Copper City Commercial Company in their general offices.

DAVID REISE HOPKINS, yardmaster for the North- ern Pacific Railroad at Laurel, and one of the ranch owners of Carbon County, is one of the substantial men of Yellowstone County. He was born at Logan, Utah, January 4, 1871, a son of W. T. Hopkins, born in Wales in 1843, and died at Logan, Utah, in 1914. His father was killed in an accident in a coal mine in Wales, and following that sad event his widow, in 1851, came to the United States and located in North Ogden, Utah, where her son, W. T. Hopkins, was reared. Her father, Robert Roberts, a native of Wales, accompanied his daugh- ter to the United States and died at Farmington, Utah, before David Reise Hopkins, his grandson, was born. By occupation he was a quarryman, and he was one of the pioneers of Utah.

W. T. Hopkins passed through many exciting experiences during the epoch which saw the develop- ment of Utah. He and his people connected them- selves with the Mormons and, as did the others of that sturdy and industrious band, worked hard to overcome the obstacles raised by nature and the Indians to prevent any permanent settlement there by the whites. That they did succeed and brought prosperity and wealth to a trackless region are matters of history. During his youth W. T. Hop- kins assisted his stepfather in farming, and grew up strong and courageous and was made a member of the band of minute men organized to protect the Mormons from attacks from the hostile Indians. He drove a bull team three round trips from Salt Lake City to Omaha Landing, now South Omaha, Nebraska, as a freighter, taking his life in his hands on each trip. Loving adventure for its own sake, he took up railroad construction work and followed it until 1894, when, acquiring a ranch, he spent the remainder of his life in operating it. He was a strong supporter of the republican party. In him the Mormon Church had a conscientious member. Fraternally he belonged to the Knights of Pythias. He married Ann Roberts at Logan, Utah, born in Wales in 1843, and she survives him, making her home at Logan. Their children were as follows: Sarah Catherine, who married Moses Thatcher, a

coal and ice dealer of Logan, Utah; David R., who was the second in order of birth; W. T., Jr., who died at the age of sixteen years.

Until he was sixteen years old David R. Hopkins attended the public schools of Logan, and then began to he self-supporting. In 1886 he came to Montana and for four years was on a ranch at what is now Lima, but was then known as Spring Hill. Leaving the ranch, he became a ,brakeman on the Utah Northern Railroad, with which he con- tinued until 1894, being principally employed at and near Lima, but in that year left for the Montana Union Railroad as yardman at Butte, Montana. In 1905 he was transferred to Billings, Montana, with the Northern Pacific Railroad, which had absorbed the Montana Union Railroad, as yardmaster, and remained there until 1918, when he was placed in charge of the company's yards at Laurel, which are very extensive, covering four square miles. Under his immediate supervision are seventy-five men and the other interests connected with the con- duct of the company's interests at this point. Mr. Hopkins also owns a fine ranch of 320 acres in Carbon County, Montana.

In 1894 Mr. Hopkins was married at Lima, Mon- tana, to Miss Lillian Baker, born at Mapleton, Kansas. Mr. and Mrs. Hopkins became the parents of the following children: Alfred, who died in infancy; W. B., who was born December 19, 1897, is serving in the United States Navy, overseas ; Sarah, who was born March 14, 1902, is at home attending the Laurel High School; Blodwyn, who was born March 24, 1904; and David R., Jr., who was born December 29, 1906. Mr. Hopkins is noted for his energy, sincerity and his reliability, it being a matter of common knowledge that he lives up to his promises and that when he undertakes to get a thing done it is accomplished satisfactorily and expeditiously.

C. P. HAMRICK. The opportunities for advance- ment in Montana are almost limitless provided they are grasped when presented by hands that have been trained to be useful, and directed by practical brains. The records of any industry, particularly in the West, show that the men who have risen to positions of trust and responsibility are those who have made their own way in life, unaided by col- legiate training or outside influence. Such a man is C. P. Hamrick, assistant manager of the Bear Creek Coal Company of Bear Creek, Montana, a man of practical ideas and well versed in the methods of honorable industry. He was born at Denver, Colorado, August 29, 1878, a son of J. M. Hamrick, now a resident of Calhoun, Colorado, but by birth a native of Virginia, as he came into the world in Culpeper County, that state, in 1849, his ancestors having come to that section in colonial days from Scotland and Ireland. J. M. Hamrick was reared in his native state, but was married in Tennessee to Emma Gold Spindle, born in Virginia in 1853, and soon thereafter he came west to Denver, Colorado, where for a number of years he con- ducted a general merchandise business. In 1905 he went to Calhoun, Colorado, where he owns a large ranch, at that time being one of the pioneers of the section. A strong democrat, he has held various local offices in the several communities in which he has lived, and has always taken a prominent part in civic affairs. He has two children, C. P., whose name heads this review; and J. M., Jr., who is a successful business man of Denver, Colorado.

C. P. Hamrick was reared in his native city, and attended its schools until he was sixteen years of age. At that time he felt the urge toward a business

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HISTORY OF MONTANA

career, and left school to engage with the C. S. Morey Mercantile Company, with which he remained for twelve years, working from his initial position as office boy to be one of the company's traveling salesmen, his territory being the State of Colorado. The business of this company was the handling of groceries at wholesale. In 1909 Mr. Hamrick came to Montana, and after a short period spent at Butte, entered the employ of the Great Western Sugar Company at Billings. Later he was connected with Yeager Brothers, Incorporated, as general office man, remaining with that concern until March I, 1914, when he was made bookkeeper for the Bear Creek Coal Company, being promoted to the position of assistant manager, the manager being Chris Yeager of Billings. The plant and offices are one mile west of the town of Bear Creek, and Mr Hamrick has 200 men under his supervision. The mine produces semi-bituminous coal and has a ca- pacity of 1,800 tons per day.

In 1908 Mr. Hamrick was married at Denver, Colorado, to Miss Beda Lingren, born at Stockholm, Sweden, but reared in Illinois and given a high school education. Mr. and Mrs. Hamrick have no children. His political sentiments make him an independent democrat. Fraternally he belongs to Bear Tooth Lodge No. 534, Benevolent and Pro- tective Order of Elks, of Red Lodge, Montana. Mr. Hamrick's success in life is his own product, and he holds the confidence of his employers and the respect of his men, being recognized by his asso- ciates as one upon whom responsibilities may be safely laid, for he will never shirk them or fail to accord impartial justice to both sides. -

JOSEPH E. PICKENS since coming to Montana in 1907 has played a varied and useful part in the af- fairs of Huntley, where he is a merchant, post- master and rancher.

He is descended from ancestors who left England in colonial times and settled in America. His grand- father was born in 1801 and was one of the pioneer farmers around Newcastle, Indiana, where he died in 1889. William Pickens, father of the Huntley merchant, was born in Indiana in 1840, grew up there, married in Iowa, and for several years lived at Muscatine in that state and from there went to the Nebraska frontier and homesteaded 160 acres at Powell. In 1862 he was one of the gold seekers to come to Virginia City, Montana, and had some varied experiences and adventures before he went back to Muscatine, Iowa. He is now living retired at Huntley. Politically he is a democrat. William Pickens married Celinda Thornton, who was born at Muscatine, Iowa, itt 1847 and died at Salt Lake City, Utah, in 1905. They had five children, Joseph being the youngest. Lopiz W., the oldest, is a mail clerk at Huntley; Rena is unmarried and lives with her brother Joseph; Walter R. is a farmer at Roundup, Montana, and Arthur O. is associated with his brother Joseph in business.

Joseph E. Pickens was born at Powell, Nebraska, May 14, 1884, and acquired his early education in the public schools of his native town and the high school at Fairbury, Nebraska. For two years he was a student in the University of Utah at Salt Lake City, but left college in 1905. The next two years he spent as an assayer in the mining district of DeLamar, Nevada, and did some mining on his own account for four months. He came to Huntley in 1907 and established a stock of general merchandise and out of that undertaking has developed the leading business of its kind in this part of Yellow- stone County. He now has a flourishing trade

drawn from all the country thirty miles around Huntley. It is a department store with floor space fifty by sixty feet. In connection with the store he handles the postoffice. He was appointed post- master in 1909 under the Taft administration and has had two reappointments under President Wilson, the last coming in April, 1919.

Besides these interests Mr. Pickens owns a ranch of 280 acres three miles south of Huntley and has eighty acres of valuable irrigated land a mile north- east of the same town. He also owns his store building. Mr. Pickens is a democrat in politics, and is unmarried.

JOHN CARNEY is a veteran in the service of the Northern Pacific Railway, helped build that road into Montana, and is still active as a stationary engineer at Huntley. He is one of the oldest resi- dents of Huntley and by many years of hard work has achieved a competency.

Mr. Carney was born at Canterbury, Windham County, Connecticut, April 3, 1859. His father, Daniel Carney, was born in County Tipperary, Ire- land, in 1814, grew up there and learned the trade of marble cutter, and in 1848 established his home at Canterbury, Connecticut. He lived the rest of his life as a farmer and died in October, 1888. He was a democrat and a Catholic, and during the Civil war was a Union soldier throughout the period of hostilities with the Eighteenth Connecticut Infantry. Daniel Carney married Johannah Brean, who was born in County Kerry, Ireland, in 1829. She died at Canterbury, Connecticut, in June, 1867, John being the oldest of her five children. Mary, the second in age, died at the age of forty-nine at Norwich,. Connecticut, where her husband, John Savage, a teamster, is still living. Timothy died at Elizabeth, Colorado, at the age of twenty. Daniel owns a large farm and is a prosperous resident of Earlville, Illi- nois. Johannah, the youngest, died at the age of eighteen.

John Carney lived on his father's Connecticut farm until he was seventeen years of age. In the mean- time he had attended the common schools of Can- terbury, and on leaving home he learned the butcher's trade at Jewett City in his native state. He was there two years, went to Mendota, Illinois, in 1876 and worked on a farm and in 1881 came to Montana as part of the construction forces building the Northern Pacific Railway to Glendive. At Glendive he helped build the roundhouse and the railroad yards, and while there was made locomo- tive engineer. He was in command of the throttle until 1888. He was run over by a car in the Glen- dive Yards and lost his right foot. Incapacitated for train service, he was assigned to duty as engi- neer in the shops from 1890 to 1895, and in the latter year was transferred to Huntley, where he has charge of the railroad pumping house and has been steadily and faithfully on that job for over twenty years.

In the meantime he has become owner of a modern home at Huntley, and owns a valuable irrigated farm of forty acres east of the town. He has been active in local affairs, serving for the past eight years as justice of the peace, and for seven years was chairman of the School Board. Mr. Carney is a republican, a member of the Catholic Church, and is affiliated with Billings Star Lodge No. 41, of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.

March 7, 1917, at Norwich, Connecticut, he mar- ried Miss Mary E. Archer, daughter of John and Mary (Collier) Archer. Her father was a gun- smith and both her parents died at Norwich.

At& audus

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HISTORY OF MONTANA

HARRY E. ANDRUS gave to the business men and citizens generally in Montana an instance of unusual enterprise, foresight and public spirit when in 1916 he built the splendid Hotel Andrus at Dillon. The people of that community had for a number of years been deploring the fact that it was without ap- propriate hotel facilities, and it was known that the lack of such accommodations was imposing a severe handicap upon its normal commercial development and prosperity. However, there had appeared no individual or group of citizens ready to solve the problem and invest the money required until Mr. Andrus, who for many years had been a successful rancher in Montana, sold his ranch and with the proceeds determined to give Dillon not only a first class hotel, but a monument of real progressiveness and public spirit.

When the hotel was completed the investment totaled $165,000. Mr. Andrus is not only the builder but has continued as its manager, and has seen to it that the service and accommodations are fully up to the high standard set by the building itself. Hotel Andrus is now regarded as one of the four leading hotels of Montana, and no one thing has done more to give Dillon a place among the thriving cities of the state than this institution.

Mr. Andrus, who has spent much of his life in the West, was born at Lafayette, Indiana, August 30, 1867. His father, Horace Andrus, was, a native of Illinois, and for a number of years was a farmer near Lafayette. The mother was Mary Slaughter, a native of Kentucky, now living at Boulder, Colo- rado, where her husband died in 1904. They were the parents of eight children: James, a rancher in Colorado; Clara, who died in 1914, leaving seven children by her husband, James C. G. Smith, who is now clerk and recorder at Fredonia, Kansas, and in the real estate business there; Frank, a rancher at Ladore, Idaho; Harry E .; Lula, wife of C. K. Blanton, a rancher at Boulder, Colorado, and the mother of two children; Mary, wife of Sawyer Clark, a real estate and insurance man at Boulder ; Bert, a rancher at Boulder; and Barbara, wife of John Platt, a physician at Lead, South Dakota. The parents of these children were active Presbyterians and the father was a republican.

Harry E. Andrus acquired his education in the public schools of Kansas and Colorado and had some farming experience in both those states. He was a young man twenty-two years of age, had a wife and one child, when behind a span of mules he rode into the State of Montana in 1899. In Montana he put his previous experience to good use, locating in the Sheep Creek Basin and buying a ranch. In the course of a few years he had 1,200 acres devoted to cultivation and as pasture ground for his sheep, and eventually through leasing of land other than that he controlled his ranch domain was 8 by 12 miles square. At times his flocks enumerated as high as 7,000 sheep, and he had one of the best herds of Hereford cattle in the county. He also raised a number of high grade horses. For a quarter of a century all his energies were devoted to ranching, and in 1916 he sold out and devoted the fruits of his long labors to the conspicuous improvement at Dil- lon above noted.

Mr. Andrus, who is a man deservedly popular throughout Beaverhead County, is a democrat in poli- tics and a member of the Knights of Pythias and the Woodmen of the World. In 1890 he married Margaret Rosenbaum of Boulder, Colorado, dangh- ter of Antone Rosenbaum of that city. They are the parents of three children, Fern, born in 1897, living at home; Wilma, born in 1898, wife of J. T. Colfer,

of Seattle; and Harry, born in 1901, now attending school at Pacific Beach, California.

GEORGE A. WESTOVER is one of the leading mem- bers of the Stillwater County Bar, has been in prac- tice at Columbus for ten years, and is mayor of that city.

He was born at Albion in Boone County, Nebraska, June 9, 1884. The Westover family are English and were colonial settlers in Pennsylvania. His grandfather, Amatha Westover, was born in Iowa in 1834, when Iowa was a territory. He lived much of his life along the frontier, and was a pioneer farmer of Eastern Nebraska. He died at Lincoln in that state in 1899. His wife, Ann Westover, was born in Pennsylvania in 1837, and died at Lincoln, Nebraska, in 1902. J. A. Westover, father of the Columbus lawyer, was born in Iowa in 1861, but was reared in Eastern Nebraska, and from Lincoln during the early eighties moved to Boone County, where he engaged in the real estate business for a number of years. He returned to Lincoln in 1898, continued as a real estate operator, and since 1915 has lived retired at Billings, Montana. He is a republican. At Lincoln, Nebraska, in 1882, he mar- ried Mina C. Fusha. She was born in 1862 at Vergennes, Vermont. Of their six children George A. is the oldest. Edward J. is associated with his next younger brother, Robert L., in the Yellowstone Trail Garage at Billings, Montana. Leo D., the fourth of the family, is a mechanic living at Omaha, Nebraska, while Joe F. makes his home at East- port, New York, and is mechanical tester for the Curtiss Aeroplane Company. The youngest of the family is Florence F., wife of Merle E. Smith, an insurance man at Billings.

George A. Westover attended public school in Lincoln, Nebraska, graduating from high school in 1906. He finished his course in the Law Department of the University of Nebraska at Lincoln in 1909, and during the following year practiced in Ne- braska's capital city. He came to Columbus in 1910, and has since been busy with a general civil and criminal practice. His offices are in the Columbus State Bank Building. Mr. Westover is a member of the Yellowstone Valley Bar Association, is a republican and is affiliated with Yellowstone Lodge No. 85, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, Billings Lodge No. 394 of the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.

At Lincoln, Nebraska, January 1, 1914, he married Miss Nettie E. Wood. Her mother, Mrs. Emeline Wood, lives at Harvard, Nebraska. They have three children: Roland W., born September 30, 1914; June Irene, born June 27, 1916; and Norris Edward, born January 27, 1918.

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Montana, its story and biography; a history of aboriginal and territorial Montana and three decades of statehood, Volume II, Part 105

Author: Stout, Tom, 1879- ed Publication date: 1921 Publisher: Chicago, American Historical Society Number of Pages: 1126

Author: Stout, Tom, 1879- ed
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: Chicago, American Historical Society
Number of Pages: 1126