PAGE 1 Show Image
w V . * * * * * 9 .
PAGE 2 Show Image
FROG AMBER GRAIN...
. . .TO FRUITEOPLAIN
A HISTORY OF CERES, CALIFORNIA AND ITS 5URROUNOINGS
1776 1976
by mildred D. Lucas
"These are the gifts of Ceres that I carry,
Whj~h9 if you scatter across your land,
IMill bring a harvest free of all iueeds and thorns.~'
-Ovid
(L
½
j#½2½ ~ / L ~
&
~£2 //
PAGE 3 Show Image
Copyright 1976
by
mildred 0. Lucas
Ceres, California
Published under the auspices of the
Ceres Bicentennial Committee
in cooperatio IMith the
Ceres Unified School Oistrict
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
First £dition
Printed in The United 5tates of America
2
PAGE 4 Show Image
Dedicated to
`YIY~TLE BA~O~ID~E HA~
ThE OLD CE~ES 5TUDY CLUB
and
ALL C~R~SEAN5
Who Have An Abiding Interest In Preserving And Imparting
A Kno~1edge Of This Communityes Origins And Peop1~s
PAGE 5 Show Image
PREFACE
The idea ~or this book began with the Ceres Study Club,
just before it disbanded, and was the special interest of
myrtle Baidridge Ham. She died on Easter Sunday, 1975 soon
after attending thR first meeting of Ceres people organizing
the community observance of our country's bicentennial year.
The author and two other past members of the Study Club. were
asked by mayor Gary Condit and Bicentennial Committee chair-
man Robert Whitmore to carry the idea to fruition.
The initial concept of a booklet containing portraits
and biographies of a few af the earliest families has been
expanded to tell the story of a farming village, by narra-
tives, biographies, diary and newspaper excerpts, census,
court and school records. Historical data has been gathered
from reliable sources, original matter and primary documents
being used wherever available. IMe are particularly grateful
to myrtle Holm Price for granting petmission to use the old
diaries and papers of Arvilla Averill Ulch and Florence Ulch
Worrell. Caryl Fowler gave ab£e assistance from her years
of experience as a reporter, especially on matter pertaining
to modern Ceres~ Ruth Caswell Jorgensen provided stimulus and
interest; and I give additional thanks to my husband, Grant
Lucas, who has a never-failing and contagious interest in his
home town. (3ne of the bonuses of compiling the book has been
the privilege of hearing first-hand reminiscences of many old-
timers. We apologize if lack of tire and space has caused im-
portant omissions.
In this bicentennial year of our nation, we hope to renew
that pride of community and family beginnings which is a part
of pride of country. A knowledge of history and traditions of
country and community is basic to this pride. The Bicentennial
Commission recognizRd the importance of individual communities
when it decided to forego great national celebrations in favor
of local activities devised by the people. We hope this book
will contribute a small part toward rekindling the patriotic
spirit and our belief in the basic soundness of our society
and way of life. It has been said many times in different ways
that through knowledge of the past on~ gains strength for the
future.
Recently, more historians have begun to realize that local
history is one of the soundest roads towards an understanding
of national history. World history is not just of generals and
popes, kings and castles, battles and discoveries. Even more
so, the history of the United States is not just of Columbus,
Lewis and Clark, the White House, the Battle of New Orleans or
the Pottsdam Conference. It is of the little towns as well as
of the cities, of the later western entrepreneur as well as of
-1-
PAGE 6 Show Image
the early plantation ownere more han in any otier country,
community life is a moving force and power to the progress,
change and stability of this nation. &omrnunity life is Amer-
ica. Therefore, the community life of £ei~. ~ worthy o~ re-
counting, for it fills one spot in the viable history o~ a
developing nation.
A sell-governing people decides its own destiny as it
works and votes and plays and volunteers and interacts. In
each co~munity, local leaders and talkersand followers and
workers contribute their part to larger attitudes. IMe relate
our local experience t~ th~ national experience as we argue,
develop prejudices and ~ encounter and react to
ideas outside, absorb dii~t~ting cultures and thus evolve our
own ideas and line style.
While no attempt has been made to overturn moldy stones
to see what would crawl out, or to rattle pQs~ible skeletons
in any extant closets, it has been the wish o~ those contri-
buting to these pages to t~~l a human narrative with some
color and spice rather thar to adopt an old-style leglorified
obituary" manner. ~e hope ~e have been able to convey to the
reader a sense of the worth and variety of the ~eres people
who make our small American community typical and at the same
time unique, a very reai part ot the heritage a~d future of
our developing nation.
mildred D. Lucas
ceres--may, 1975
2
PAGE 7 Show Image
£ONTENT5
I. 1776-1870, B.£.: 5OUTH OF THE TUOLUmNE, B~FOR~ CERES 7
II. "£ERES" 9
III. 600 AND 6000E55 13
I',. FOUNOINE FAIYIILIE5 AND S~TTLE0 SETTLES 21
`1. ~I~VE GOT THE iAiATER~' 95
VI. THE TOWN 103
VII. THE COUNTRY AROUND 121
VI II. TOWN AND COUNTRY MEET 129
IX. A WOmAN~5 LOT 157
X. EARTH AND ALTAR 165
XI. EDUCATION: FORMAL AND INFORUIAL 185
XII. "WHERE DO YOU TRADE?" 199
XIII. ALL THE NEWS THAT FITS 209
XIV. A ROAD BY ANY OTHER NATE 211
Citizen of the Year Aiuards 118
Goddesses and Peaches 118
Dates Important in Ceres History 196
Residents and Businesses of Ceres, 185485 215
Residents and Businesses of Ceres, 1893 217
-3-
PAGE 8 Show Image
A Rabbit drive in San Joaquin Valley.
PAGE 9 Show Image
I I e
&/il ~ Y-A x---
<,~
4/ ( I' 6'6(A½ ½
(#1 ¼¼~
½½r (
jil] ~~/¾~;; /f4I /4~ ~ J ~ ¾~
(~ ~ ½
~ ~ ~ 7 # ~ I 4½~ ~ ~ ~
~ / /f~~ j6~(
PAGE 10 Show Image
1776 1570, B. C.
SOUTH OF THE TuOLumI~E, BEFORE CER~S
When Stanislaus County ~as rormed in 1554 from a portion
of Tuolumne County the area south of the Tuo~umne River that
later became knci~in as Ceres formed a quiet center in the midst
o~ grasslands dotted with a few oak trees.
none of the early trail-blazers who crisscrossed the area
came through. In 1?76, when the American Revolution was in
full swing, Joaquin moraga passed.by north of the Tuolumne. In
1506, just when the Lewis and Clark expedition was returning
to St. Louis, Gabriel moraga and Padre munoz came close but
still missed the site~o~ Ceres as they went by to the east. In
1844, James K. Polk was elected president on the slogan "54-40
or Fight'. and James C. Fremont9 who was crossing the future
Stanislaus County, stayed well away from the central part of
it. Jack Brotherton, Stanislaus County historian, shows on
his county historical map that El Camino Viejo, established in
the 1540's for cattle drives, was far to the west of Ceres-to-be.
The Coconoons and the Potoancies, subdivisions of the iflodoc
Indian tribe, lived in the area between the Tuolumne and merced
Rivers. They were also called by the general term "Walla-Wallas.'.
In 1851, major James 0. Savage gave the number of Tuolumne River
Indians as 2,100, and another authority stated that as early as
1852 the only Indians in Stanislaus County were 20 at Bonsell's
Ferry and about 250 at Knight's Ferry. So one could say with
reasonable certainty that there were no Indians remaining in the
area when Ceres was settled.
Daniel IAJhitmore, called the Founder of Cere~, acquired some
of his future vast acreage and moved upon it in 1867, his wagons
striking across the open ground from San Joaquin County. Roads
and houses and town were yet to be created. However, at least
thirteen years prior to the birth of Ceres, the lands west along
the south bank of the Tuolumne and along the east bank of the
San Joaquin were beginning to attract settlers. In this greater
area that is now called the Ceres sphere of influence and at the
northwest corner of the present Ceres Unified School District,
was Adamsville, the first county seat. Ada~sville was the scene
or the killing of George Worth, sheriff of Tuolumne County, un-
der the courthouse oak, by £arley Lyons. The site is on the
riverbank, on private land, about opposite Iowa Avenue north of
the river. The old courthouse itself still remained until the
late 1960's when it was torn down to make iuay for a concrete
block house.
-7-
PAGE 11 Show Image
We have heard much of grain raising in early days but not
so much o~ sheep9 cattle and hogs. Yet sheep raising iuas well
under way by 1556, south of the Tuolumne, and hogs roamed the
river bottom lands while cattle roamed the uplands with a few
remaining wild horses.
Davis 5chool District, later to become Ceres~ first school,
was a going concern by 156Q. The desc~dants of a number of
the river land settlers Df the 185O~s have become identified
with ~eres area history and progress. And, most interesting
of all, Levi carter owned tha land, grew grain, and built ware-
houses on the site of ~er~s, prior to its founding.
-5-
PAGE 12 Show Image
CERES
Dear little spot, still and serene,
The home of Teinperance,
Thy fields so lair ~nd green
Ne'er happened so by chance.
Thy citizens in numbers few
Oevoted are, to good;
Industrious and frugal, too,
Ho~ sweet their quietude.
They plow and plant, they sow and reap
And gather in their grain.
O'er all their ways, strict vigils keep,
They thus enrich the plain.
No plagues of rum to curse and blight
Our fair young toun;
No drunks or brawls by day or night
Its prestige to drag down.
No demon dark, pith subtle wiles
Can lure it from it~ stand
Of solid moral principles,
The best in all the land.
Oh happy people, do ye know
Of what intrinsic worth
Are all these privileges to you?
Surpassing all on earth.
Then cheri~h well these blessings grand
Nor think them commonplace,
A noble fruitage they'll command
As time rolls on apace.
--A. E. Ulch
"The Ceres Scraper", 1902
9
PAGE 13 Show Image
b~ *
e
D
, 0
90
b
,
9 0
~~
`. 0
C O~ ~ ~
6
0')
PAGE 14 Show Image
THF SAN JOAQUIN VALLFv.
½& ½#½½½
_ `~`;~~ `
~½½½½ ~ * ~ 4
Wheat Teams, waiting to unload.
PAGE 15 Show Image
3<&3,#'v y.a/
:1)10 ~ I
(/½1~'~~ ¼
A'~/~½¼u$£~f;/ 4:) 9 ¼½,,½~¾
4½, ~ ½ I
O,1o( ~ C~ ~ l6~/'% 4~/~½
~;1 /ae~ ~ &,,~ ¼o('~%/P~~ /)!~/ ~
r
I )
% V
I my t~ £ X~ ~ ~) ~ , ~ 0/ ev ~ ~ 4 C(
x ~ ~6/f~~~< ~&(~fJ /~,~4) ~ /e) ~ /~
~ ~ V ~ ~ ~ ½i~ ½~~1 ¼ ~ 4 V
1
~½ ~
~ ;(~t, ~
~ ~ C# ~
4 $~ ,~* ~ <,-~
Early day combine harvestar in Ceres area.
PAGE 16 Show Image
GOD AND (3000E55
"The Goddess Ceres hath #*The harvest is past,
Filled their threshin~-f1oor the sumner is ended,
In plenteous measure. .3 and we are not saved."
-heocritus -Jeremiah VIII:20
Ceres stands for health, beauty, fruitfulness, wholesome
ness. She is the natural giver of life and happiness, the great
Earth-mother. £eres, the fruitful goddess, epitomizes love of
life. That a town which from its beginnings prided itself upon
its christian piety and temperance should select as its name-
giver a Roman, pre-Christian goddess who presided ever pagan
festivals of fertility and harvest has apparently never bothered
many of its citizens.
It will come as a surprise to many that when alma J. Carter,
the school-teacher daughter of Levi Carter, chose the classical
name of Ceres in 1q71, she was naming her father3s granary and
warehouses along the new railroad, not a future temperance town.
Daniel Whitmore3s first home in Stanislaus County had been on
land nearer the river since 1567. The Services and Warners,
who had come the same year, were south of the townsite. When
Daniel built his new home in late 1870 and moved into it in
1571, he had not yet purchased the land on which it stood.
According to a story told by Jennie Whitmore Caswell, the
grand-daughter of Daniel, Levi Carter and her grandfather were
rivals. Perhaps each had a town in mind when he heard that the
path of the railroad was settled--and Carter owned the land.
Could it have been Daniel, or was it Levi perhaps, who was the
settler quoted in the Sacramento `3Union" for April 17, 1868? It
is a description quoted from the Stockton ~9Gazette" describing
the Ceres area and soijth. Perhaps Daniel and Levi each had
reasons and motives beyond the coming of the railroad in 1871
to found a totiuni
"Westport (the river town) is situated on a bluff,
a mile or so above Paradise. Behind lies the dis-
trict which has been seeded this season. The coun-
try in the rear is rapidly filling up. In evidence
of which, one of the settlers told us the following:
Last Fall, he settled out on the plain, 4 miles off,
alone; now he can count forty dwellings from the
top of his house, and at a schoolhouse nearby there
are fifty-three children taught. Great preparations
are being made to extend the area of tilled surface
. . . the country in which (they) are located is at
this season lovely beyond description. They and
-13-
PAGE 17 Show Image
the lands adjoining tAijil be the seat of competency
and refinement at no distant ti'ne, which will be
enjoyed by a large population. I,
One must remember, of course, that the flat land enabled
one to see for miles, as far away as Turlock now is, so those
forty dwellings were scattered over an area much larger than
the immediate vicinity o~ Ceres. Westport was a river town
of short life, on the south bank of the Tuolumne about where
Carpenter Road now crosses the river.
As the plows began tjrning over the soil for the first
time, an early opportunity arose to balance Christian princi-
ples of harmony with economic necessity. The stock men with
their cattle and sheep had heretofore had no barriers. The
*`Union" article continues: "Amicable arrangements were early
made between the farmers and stock owners, by which the far-
mer agreed to herd the stock off the land seeded, until the
cessation of rains and the hardening of the ground should
permit the employment of horses to collect the cattle. .
the stock. . . driven to points remote from the cultivated
territory."
The group of people who were later to become Ceres' fledg-
ling population were isolated from one another. most traffic
was still passing to the north and the railroad was still in
its initial stages. An L. P. mc , writing for the Paci-
fic Rural Press, in his notes of travel in Stanislaus and £al-
averas counties in 1871, mentions only the settlements of
~ Ferry, Buenavista and Fourth £rossing. Oirt wagon
tracks connected some of the farms. The ferry on the Tuolumne
River's south bank, near the spot where the Central Pacific
Railroad bridge crossed, formed the main contact with the out-
~r world. This ferry was first known as the Oavis Ferry and
was probably started by the Harvey Bates Davis (see Education:
Formal and Informal) who had another ferry further up the Tuo-
lumne on the north bank, from 1850-60. The ferry nearest the
site of Ceres was begun in 18~7. In 1877 Daniel Whitmore took
it over and operated it until the first passenger bridge was
built in 18a3.
In addition to the ferries there was a place called Sand
Banks or the Sand Hill where wheat barges loaded to cross the
Tuolumne River. It was located on river bottom land, north of
present Hatch Road and east of mitchell Road on what is now the
Triplett property. According to a 1909 soil survey of the area,
dunelike ridges of wind-blown sand occurred commonly on the up-
land immediately south of the Tuolumne.
~ellinof~eres
The Whitmores, the Services and the Warners gathered about
themselves a small nucleus of temperate, church-going, like-
-14-
PAGE 18 Show Image
minded people. In 1572, aster ~~ve~a1 buildings had been
built, ~ihitmore bought the site o~ O'~s. An indenture was
made on November 8, 1q72 between Levi Carter and Oaniel Whit-
more for a portion of land which calls between Central Avenue
on the east and Tenth 5treet on the west, and between Whitmore
Avenue on the north and 5ervi~e Road on the south. The sum
that Daniel paid Levi was $9,OOO~ carter carefully reserved to
himself a 300 X 500 foot piece along the railroad on which stood
a granary and warehouse he had built. (Book 9, Pp. 361-362, Stan-
islaus County Deeds)
As the couiti'y~ide was settled and the town began filling
up, newcomers sound a unique clause on every deed of land pur-
chased ~rorn Whitmore. It was also on all the town lot deeds
whether one that was bought or one that Whitmore gave away to
encourage people to settle in Ceres. The title to the prop-
erty was to revert to the Whitmore gamily if intoxicating bev-
erages were manufactured or sold on the land, or ~n any street
or road surrounding ite*
This was at the height c; the temperance movement, which
was also so closely associate~ with many Protestant churches
that activities were interwoven. And in the village of Ceres,
the same people were involved i~ both temperance and church
work. In the summer of 187w, ~ rumor went around town that a
.`whisky shop" was to be started on a piece of land belonging
to the railroad which had no restrictions upon it. (Carter~s
reserved piece of land?) A mass meeting was called to fight
the danger. As \1iola Averill craig IAirote about the threat:
N
. . . strange as it may seem, here where the tern-
perance principles were so strong, there were those
who favorer having one of those pitfalls in their
midst." Despite the strong and organized opposi-
tion, she goes on, Nthere was a man bold enough and
bad enough to erect a shanty and put over his door
the single word `saloon' and ~ suppose the fur-
nishings inside were th~ ~~dl bottles and glasses,
kegs of beer an~ tobacco and perhaps a few jars of
candy to entice some of th~ boys who had a sweet
tooth; ~ut his business did not prosper, and he
found himself isolated from all other members of
society, and very few cared to be seen going inside
*A5 this clause constituted a lien against the property, Whit-
more U
5 heirs were asked by some owners to remove the stipulation.
The restriction was rescinded for many veterans following World
War II so they could obtain loans. However~ the wording still
appears on many deeds.
PAGE 19 Show Image
his door to see what he did keep there. He contin
ued his unpro~itab1e business for about tLJO years,
receiving the most of his patronage from the kind
of travelers that can most always rind ten cents to
buy a drink, but seldom one with which to buy bread.
lAihen the opportunity came he gladly availed himself
of it to sell out to one Prather, a stranger. He
came and erected an hotel with a bar-room in it,
then brought his wife and daughter and established
himself there, but ~ somewhat chagrined to find
himself and family entirely ignored by all the other
people. This was more than he could stand, and he,
too, was glad to sell out and go to a more congen
ial place. Since that time the hotel has been run
on strictly temperance principles, and many a jibe
has the place received because no other drink than
pure, cold water can be obtained by the thirsty way-
farer.
mrs. Oavid K. ~oodbridge was the one who bought the hotel.
Daniel Whitmore is said to have put $5,000 cash into the project,
also. IYlrs. ~oodbridge enlarged the building and sold it to fflrs.
Nancy Conner as a temperance hotel.
The First Harvest Festivals
The harvest celebrations of Ceres have a long tradition
in the community. The first ones were held in the earliest
days when neighbors helped one another to harvest the grain
in the old manner, and then feasted and played afterwards.
This was not only a common practice of the time but was es-
pecially appropriate for an agricultural place called Ceres.
The harvest crews who came for the season (some of whom stayed
and became farmers on their own) were the first itinerant work-
ers to come to the Valley, and were always included in harvest
celebrations. An up-to-date version of this is the harvest
festival sponsored each year for farmers and their workers by
the Growers I Harvesting Committee, based in Ceres.
The feasts became more formally organized when they were
held in connection ~iith the Ceres Grange, beginning in 1873.
Then, when a Grange Hall was built in 1880, the celebrations
were held both outside and inside the hall. The town that had
fought against liquor so hard was not so opposed to dancing,
though it was sometimes disguised under the name of *`play-party
names". IA'. G. munger, an early pioneer, was the fiddler for
the dances.
Other amusements in the growing years included picnics on
the Picnic Grounds which were on John Fox's land bordering the
Tuolumne river, trips to Calaveras Big Trees, ice cream socials
and camp meetings.
-16-
PAGE 20 Show Image
The Harvest Festival held in September-October, 1968 was
combined with the Fiftieth Anniversdry celebration o~ the in-
corporation of the town. It began1 in keeping with tradition,
with church services in all the local churches hollowed by a
pot-luck dinner and high school band concert in the park, near
the site o~ the old Grange Hall. C)ther events during the week
included the Goddess of ~eres pageant, talent show, historical
exhibits, carnival, parade, square dances and street dance.
Farm exhibits also were arranged. The gathering in the park
and the reminiscenctng later in the Community Center around
the historical exhibits formed the high point for the many old-
timers and school alumni who came. It had sparked the same
spirit that a similar reunion, the first one, of Ceres residents
and ex-residents had in 1895. Though the earlier reunion had
more speeches than the one in 1968, it also included music of
all varieties, a picnic in the Fox Grove, and much *~visiting. I'
Those working on the Fiftieth Anniversary event as chair-
men and coordinators included Robert IAhhitmore, Elton Turner,
the Reverend James Bradford, Gus Pallios, Ray Rohde, mrs. James
( myrtle) Price, mrs. Russell (Jessie) rowe, Bert Stevenson, mrs.
IAiilliam (Betty Gail) Bilson, Kenneth Achterberg, mrs. Raymond
morrow, George Schimel, Chesley Ludden, Chub Sterling, Robert
`Abix, Jake Dillon, Jim Bergamaschi, LeRoy Barbour, and mrs. and
mrs. Gene Welsh.
The Outer World Intrudes God and country
Outside politic8l events affected people in Ceres and they
often had their own way of reacting to them. The depression of
the 157O~s and later slumps, elections, wars--all made their
little ripples in the village. A few revealing excerpts from
the diaries of Allura E. Ulch tell their own stories:
`8June 2nd, 1898--I read the tall's dispatches to-night
about Com~odore Schley's Naval battle and victory at
Santiago de tuba and feel hopeful that another engage
ment will destroy the Spanish fleet under Cervera and
make the victory complete. I will now read a few
words in John~s Gospel and retire.~'
*`monday morning, July 4, 18Y8--News of the destruc-
tion of £ervera9s fleet at Santiago de tuba. It is
the Fourth of July.91
"Sept. 19, 1901--The memorial services in honor of
our late president, William mcKinley in Ceres church
this afternoon brought out a large number of people.
The exercises were all good and many lessons were
drawn from the life of our illustrious chie~."
"march 4, 1903--made out tiuo pension papers this
morning--at 25 cts. each--an easy way to get two-
bit pieces.
-17-
PAGE 21 Show Image
5bsequent i~ars had their impct upon churches and commu
nity. A service flag for World War I hung in the Congregational
Church until the building was sold. This flag was then pre-
sented to mrs. John Gondring~ Sr. since it had two stars upon
it for her tiuo sons service. There were, of course, many more
who went to war in 1917 and the ones left behind did their bits
in the way others were all over the nation--buying bonds, con-
serving food, knitting socks, rolling bandages. A grand cele-
bration was held when the boys came home, many from the town
going to San Francisco by train to see the ships sail in the
Golden Gate. During ILorid War II mrs. Gondring gave the flag
to the American Legion in Ceres so that more stars could be
added.
The second *~great war saw an even greater proportion of
the young men in town go off to fight, and the town rallied in
many of the traditional ways mentioned above. An added element
this time, remembers irs. Earl (Evelyn) Brown, was the airplane
spotting station maintained on Service Road on the John Newkirk
ranch, in a wooden tower he constructed for the purpose. The
women, and some men, manned this station. men who stayed at
home also patrolled the streets and roads at night checking
for black-out violations, and some trained with members of the
National Guard. A distinct loss to the community at this time
was the incarceration, upon the orders of Governor Earl Warren,
of the members of the area who were of Japanese birth or an-
cestry.
Those interested in the impact of World War II upon Ceres
will find the clipping books compiled by mr. and mrs. Dorsey
Turner of interest. They are on reserve at the Florence Gon-
dring Library and may only be used there.
-18-
PAGE 22 Show Image
¼
) ½
ABOVE:Mr. and Mrs. Daniel w;iitmore, fojnders of Ceres came to Ceres in 1867 wit~i Mr.
and Mrs. John Service (LOWER LEFT). Another early settler was George W. Averill,
PAGE 23 Show Image
¼. ¼.. ½ Wi;// , n . , ,
~`t/e /( ~ 4~ tqt t It rn an t
a-,,' e i
~
¼. ¼~½¾/4(~ ½a~(//, ~ ~ 13
½;4eJ(4y/ e~.'en(n~ ~ ~~y/~een/#
~ ~ ~
¼4?(~, ¼()a//~(~.
Wedding invitations in early 1900's. J.N Cross and Henry Caswell famlies on camping trip. Hatch~ family
show their catch. Left to right, Henry Cole, Arch~ie McNeil, Floyd Jo1inson and Harold Joiii~son. Mrs. Viola
Averill Craig.
~ ~
~
PAGE 24 Show Image
FOUNDING FAMILIES ANO SETTLED SETTLERS
"This quiet Dust ~as Gentleinen and Ladies,
A~d Lads and Girls;
LAtas laughter and ability and sighing9
And frocks and curls."
Einily Dickinson
There are four distinct periods in the settlement of the
Ceres area, dramatized by both local and national occurrences.
1854-1900-The earliest settlers, meaning the land-owners and
IF~~eusinessmen, were a mixture of the New England and middle
lAlest farmer and crartsman, for the most part, seeking new and
inexpensive land. These were combined with the more stable
gold-seekers, including some from other countries, who had de-
cided to stay when the sold fever ran its course. A few in
the early days also came seeking health. There were, too, how-
ever, though they are unchronicled by name except in the census
records, Chinese cooks with such names as Koy Ah, Sam Ching,
Ah Soh, and hired hands whose birthplaces were Hesse tassel,
Canada, Holstein, Portugal, Prussia.
It is interesting to see, from the following biographies,
how many had come first to other parts o~ California, espec-
ially San Joaquin County, and how common it was for relatives
and friends to travel tQgether and seek one another out in
traditional pioneer migrating fashion. As so often happens,
the hardships and plainer living conditions were the lot o~
the early ones, leaving the second generation to profit the
most from the fertile tracts of land. many of the earliest
settlers left no heirs of the name, though they lived out
their lives in £eres and contributed much to its development.
1900-1930--Irrigation brought in the second period. more sett-
lersErom other states plus foreign immigrants in large numbers
--Scandinavians, Po~~uguese9 Italians. IT'uch of the contract
labor was now done by Japanese. Turlock has long been known
for its citizens of Swedish background; note how many in Ceres
have forebears from Denmark. The non-irrigated grain land was
selling, in the first years of irrigation, as a U. S. Soil Sur-
vey team remarked in 1909, for $15-$25 per acre and the non-
irrigated river bottom land for $75-$1OO, but improved irrigated
land was going for $75 to $200 per acre. An excerpt from an
article written by Thomas ~aswell on a trip to California in
February, 1901 and sent to an Iowa newspaper reads, in a pro-
phetic manner (as part of a description of a trip through the
San Joaquin Valley):
-21-
PAGE 25 Show Image
"Some of the large ranches are being broken up,
mostly by profligate I of their Ja~'. There
are a good many raising wheat on small ranches,
some of which are for sale at about half the
price of Iowa land. The boom is gone, wheat is
low, lower than normal. . . Good wheat land that
can be used to grow fruits can be bought for $20
per acre. In the colonies (Canada) they would
ask three tiffles as much for the same land. Ow-
mg to considerable rainfall, irrigation is not
availed of as much as I think it should be and
no doubt will be.'4
193O-1945--~rowth was steady after irrigation began but slow
~gto be easily assimilated by a small town until the
area began receiving its share of the Dust Bowl refugees of
the midwest and 5outhwest, aggravating the problems brought
about by the Great Depression. Housing suddenly became as
scarce and makeshift as it had been in the days of first
settlement. This group of latter-day pioneers had also,
though, largely become a part of routine Ceres life by the
outbreak of the second World War. Taking advantage of op-
portunities when they became available, they have not only
become absorbed into the community but have supplied their
share of leadership and hard-won suc ess stories. Their
names show up often in the clubs, churches and businesses.
1945- --The fourth period of growth is the present one. It
~ momentum since the middle 40's and has been
accelerated by the movement of Southern £alifornia Smog Bowl
refugees to the cleaner air of the £entral \1alley. The new
industries that have come to 5tanislaus County, especially the
ones west of ~eres, have also contributed new residents. In
addition, prosperity and the current nostalgia for a return to
the soil have begun to bring a new crop of `9week-end farmers"
from the cities. Ceres at the last special county census,
taken in 1975, had 9,544 uiithin it~ city limits and many were
beginning to realize that real plannir~g and effort will be
needed to balance progress 3nd improvement with a desirable
small-town, rural atmosphere.
Despite a normal share of small-town insularity, ~eres
has always welcomed the newcomer who really wants to become
a part of the community. (Allays excepting those first two
saloon-keepers! ) Scorn may be occasionally expressed for the
resident who uses £eres as a bedroom community and has his in-
terests elsewhere; also regretted are those who earn their
livings in £eres but refuse to become contributing citizense
A former store owner in Ceres, a Jew named Joe Berg, used to
say that he came to Ceres and was happily received after being
treated shabbily in ~ode~to. Generally, the advantages of a
small-town school system have made for natural integration from
an economic as well as a racial and religious standpoint.
-22-
PAGE 26 Show Image
In the family histories that follow, no attempt has been
made to live complete genealogies. They vary in amount of de
tail often because of the information obtainablee It was, of
course, impossible to cover all of the earlier families, or to
write biographies of the many individual families which have
arrived in more recent times. An attempt9 ratherD has been
made to show a represeritative cross-section of the variety of
peoples who have made Ceres what it is. many members of the
later families, not mentioned in a separate history, will be
in the stories of the churches and organizations, the schools,
government and businesses, giving a picture of their contri-
butions to Ceres life.
It is the hope of the author that the reader will look
for the similarities of experience as well as the differences
and make his own portrait of each period of Ceres existence.
-23-
PAGE 27 Show Image
ANNEAR
HEllen Annear brought a very pretty organdie
dress to be made for herself. She wants it
to wear to Commencement exercises next Friday
night." --A. E. Ulch
June 13, 1595
Pleasure Book No. 2
Though he did not b;~ome naturalized and thus could not
register to vote until April 8, 1579, John Greany Annear, born
in England in 1543, came to Ceres in 1572. With him came his
wife, Tabitha, who was also born in England.
Annear established the first blacksmith shop in Ceres and,
a little south o~ his shop, built the town wdtering trough.
This trough became a town gathering spot for the men and boys
and was a place to "retire to~ when the pink teas or elocution
meetings became too warm. One o~ Annear I5 early apprentices,
in 1850, was Charles Hinch, a seventeen yearold born in Cali-
fornia of a Prussian father.
In England, Annear had been orphaned early and worked as
a farm servant from the age of ten urtil he could be apprenticed
as a blacksmith. He came to Ceres by way of New Zealand, 5an
Francisco, and Napa. The blacksmith business prospered and, in
Oecember of 1574, Annear purchased more than 300 acres of land
from Levi Carter, south of Ceres. John and Tabitha Annear's
two children were born in Ceres--Ellen, born in may of 1850 and
Edgar H. born in 1554. Ellen Annear became mrs. Wilson and had
four children, ~ne of whom was named after her father but call
ed Jack. After mrs. Annear1s death in 1919, John G. made his
home with Ellen on Fifth Street.
Edgar Annear, later called "Captain" because of his World
IAlar I service, went to modesto High School (Ceres did not then
have one) and majored in engineerii~g at the University or Cali
fornia. He left Berkeley in his third year to ccept an ap-
pointment to We5t Point. ~Ainen he r~turned, he was elected the
county surveyor, and was the youngest at that time to hold e
lective orfice in the county. He also served as the county
highway engineer and is best known for his selection of the
design for and supervising the construction of the Tuolumne
River Bridge in 1917.. This bridge is the old *`Lion ~
on the old, old highway (Seventh Street in modesto) and it re-
placed the old drawbridge. Just this year Stanislaus County
and modesto have decided to restore Annear I5 bridge. Edgar
Annear is also given much credit for the county system of roads.
After duty in France, Edgar Annear returned to New York
for recruits and died there, one of the many victims of the
1915 influenza epidemic. He Wa: thirty~three years old. The
-24-
PAGE 28 Show Image
next year his rife IYIargaret was appointed deputy to the county
superintendent of s~hoo1s and later was superintendent for
many years. They had one daughter, Ellen, named after her
aunt.
AVERILL HALL
"Jesse says she has paid no water rent since she
has lived in that house, yet she has paid the
rent to IYIrs. Whitmore and has sent off money to
others who we not in need as are my brothers.
0 God, hovi long well my kind-hearted9 over-corked
and sick (almost unto death) people be thus treated
in return for their helpfulness to otherst"
A. E. Ulch
June 17, 1898
Pleasure Book No. 2
The Averill family, whose name comes up so frequently in
the early days of Ceres, was of maine birth and background.
Jesse Averill came first to California, across the Isthmus of
Panama from New York to San Francisco in 1868. His brother,
George W., joined him the next year at the small community of
Atlanta, in San Joaquin county on the French ramp Road. They
did farm work until they had s~~ed enough to set up a black-
smith and iuagon shop in 1871. Atlanta at the time had only
one other business establishment and seven dwellings. By 1879,
a year before moving to Ceres, they also owned 160 acres. mean-
while, George B. Hall had preceded th~ Averills to california,
coming in 1861. He ~as also a native of maine, the son of a
stonecutter. &oming by the same route as Jesse Averill, he
had gone first to Tuolumne County where he was in lumber trade
for seven years. He, too, moved to the French Camp road.
There he met and married Susan Averill who had joined her two
brothers in California.
The Averills and Halls came to ~eres in 1880, building a
house and taking over and enlarging d blacksmith shop started
by Daniel IAAhitmore about 1874. In addition to farm black-
5mithing and horse~~i~eing, they built `Alagons, plows, and wind-
mill blades, but the bulk of their work was repair on the large
farm machi5lery such as the combined (combine) harvester which
was first developed for the San Joaquin \1alley's huge grain
fields. They also farmed on forty acres and owned lots in town.
Lewis Publishing Co.'s 1892 history of Stanislaus County states:
`I They also own and operate the town water-works,
a portion of the plant consisting of a wind-mill
and pump, a 25,000 gallon tank, and 1,400 feet of
piping."
George We Averill served as high school janitor in later years.
-25-
PAGE 29 Show Image
The Averills were a amily of six daughters and the two
sons (George W. was called Will), when the parents died in
maine the year Jesse started ~or california. ~li of the dau-
~hters eventually joined their brothers in Ceres. Neither
George, who had been in thE Civil War, nor Jesse ever married.
Sophia Averill9 married to £harles Pace, came to Turlock in
1570 for her healthe Her only child died early as did she
and her husband. Lavina married a Warren Rollins and moved
to Kansas from maine; later she, her husband and daughter,
Linnie (fflrs. Elmer Porterfield) also same to ~eres, after igoo.
Ihe Rollins house stood ~ the south end of Fifth 5treet on
part o~ the land where H~~cock's Garage now is. mr. Rollins
had a part-time business of taking visitors to Yosemite in
a camp-wagon. The Porterfields lived for many years on the
north side of Service Road just west of the canal; later years
found them in the home just removed this year from the north-
east corner o~ Fifth and Lawrence.
Viola and Angeline also joined their brothers in ~eres.
Viola married Robert Craig, another blacksmith, and Angeline
married George Hall after her sister 5us~n, his first wise,
died in 1902.
Allura E. Averill, about whom so much has been written,
had gone prom maine to Kansas with ~ sister, Lavina Rollins.
There she taught school ~or a time and married Wesley W. Ulch,
a Pr~sbyterian ministerwho was also licensed by the methodists
to *`exhort." The Ulches had three daughters born to them, but
only one survived childhoDd. mr. Ulch also died early. After
a time of struggling for herself, the t~idow in 1580 succumbed
to her family's urging and brought her child to California. In
later years, when a few sly souls suggested that there had
never been a husband, mrs. Ulch heard of it and, a measure of
the woman, declined to refute them. She said to let them be-
lieve it if it made it more interesting for them.
The Averills were a close, loving family. When Allura
Ulch felt herself alone,a woman rnd:(i~g her way in a wild,~ild
storm, she regained her serenity through contacts with her bro-
thers and sisters. Jesse ~ve~ill loved the community's child-
ren in place of the ones he never had and started the practice
with brother Wili of the first community christmas tree. For
years, he was the one who got the tree and placed it in the
Baptist church. It was said to always be large enough to al-
most brush the ceiling. He and the children would decorate
it in the old style, with popcorn and cranberry strings and
every child in the community, whether his parents were in-
volved or not, was remembered.
Allura and IAAesley Ulch's daughter, Florence, grew up in
Ceres, graduated at San Jose Normal, became a teacher and was
twice married. She first married James E. Richards, a con-
tractor, and lived in Ukiah for 3eve~al years. When Richards
-26- jj;\r
PAGE 30 Show Image
died, she returned to Ceres and later married a widdo~uer,
Charles H. IAlorrell. A son by his first marriage, alvin
`Aicirrell, was a bus driver for the Ceres schools for many
ears; his wise Theo Worrell, taught in Ceres. Florence
called Flossie5 had no children by either marriage.
There are no descendants of the Averill famill. Their
Ceres home was moved years ago from the northeast corner of
Fourth and Lawrence to the corner of Openshaw and River Roads
where it is still, `.h~ugh parts of it have been altered. The
C. ~. Garrison family had lived in it while it was still in
Ceres, after the Averills. .ff'rs. Ulch's home was on th~ op-
posite corner of Fourth and Lawrence, where Florence's Dress
Shop now is. It now stands two blocku east at 2961 Lawrence
St.
BALDRIOG~ - Iw)EEK
~ -
ft'yrtle ~aldridge Has, in reminiscing about her parents
and grandparents. depicted them as typical adventurous pio-
neers who ~settled tempQrarily'. always looking for a better
place. They migrated. in the style of families of the 19th
century~ in a camp wagon, travelling from Arkansas and mdi-
ana to Southern £alifornia to kiah, to Bakersfield, then back
to Los Angeles ~oUc'ty.
The meeks and the Baidridges met in Southern california
and in 1586, in Ne~hall, a meek daughter married a Baidridge
son, C. F. Baldridge. ~idridge, orphaned early, was reared
by grandparents whci sent him to a borading school to learn to
be a `~~ampbellite preacheree (one must remernber that this was
a strong methodist speaking). He didn't agree and left school
to join the army a~d thus came west.
IY'rs. Ham told how her meek grandparents lost four children
in four days from diptheria while living in Hollister. mr. and
mrs. Baldridge also lived there until 1902 when they came to
Ceres, again follow~~~ theIYleek family. Ihey had finally found
the "better place~~ and spent the rest of their lives where the
new irrig~tio3 made the corn high and the fruit and melons so
delicious.
At first, in myrtle Ham's words, "I alwaysIMondered why
we came because my father had worked for a fine man (in Holli-
ster). . . and mother gave us such a bleak description of the
country that I couldn't imagine she liked it." Her mother
had gorie through the area as a girl with her parents in the
summertime, before irrigation. and "she told us we'd see miles
and miles of grain fields and in the distance an occasional
oak tree with a little house under it, that it was terribly
hot and there were lots of scorpions. But in two camp wagons
which mother's brothers brought oAiU?r from Ceres, we made the
-27-
PAGE 31 Show Image
2~2 day trip from Hollister to Ceres. . , The trip over was a
thri11in~ experience for me as it iu~s the first time I could
remember having been more than 15 miles from flome. ii
mr. Baidridge began at once to work for C. N. IAihitmore
and continued until 1929. The family lived at first on "The
Garden", as it was called by the IAihitmores and others, an ex-
perimental fruit farm on the corner of Service Road and the
highway. The boardand-batten house where they lived is still
in the center of the acreage, now part of the Bollakis place.
The board-and-batten, siry1~ wail construction was a common
type of the day; the h3use ~as later covered with shiplap aid-
mg. mrs. Ham said that fruit labels on the boxes shipped
from the farm were printed with *`The Berry Farm." The Bald-
ridge home was the scene of one of the watermelon "feeds"
given in 1905, under the auspices of the Farmeres club, to
benefit the library fund.
All of the Baldridge children--Carrie, £lbert, myrtle1
£laude, Wayne, Charles and Lawrence~-went to Ceres schools.
Charles is still living in Ceres.
The two youngest meeks, Albert and Arthur, also attended
school in ~eres. The meek home was on Ninth Street. Two
other meek brothers1 sill and Sidney1 were best known in the
town. Will built the house at the corner of Fifth and Las-
renc~. He married a teacher who tuas a cousin of mrs. Walter
White an~ settled in Berenda. Sidney married myrtle Irene
Williams of £eres and lived here for the rest of his life.
BA RB OUR
Er Barbour1 son of Dr. James m. Barbour, a native of New
York, was born in Ohio in 1861. He married Jennie Jeanette
Whitman in 1893 in Dodge City1 Kansas and lived in Oklahoma
before coming to California in 1904. He farmed in Hynes and
Colusa before coming to Ceres in 1916w He bought twenty-five
acres on mitchell Road between Fowler and Hatch Roads, and
there his last child was br:i. ~r B~rbour lived in £eres for
the rest of his life, retiring in 1938 and dying at the age
of 93 in 1954.
Of Er Barbour's ten children, eight lived to adulthood.
They were: mabel Adella who lived in Ceres and Redlands; Ger-
trude mae who graduated from Ceres High School and attended
modesto Business College; Vesta \1iola; Ruby Pearl; Claude
James; William Homer; Walter Ervin; John Henry; and Dorothy
Etta who graduated from Ceres High, modesto Junior college
and San Jose State and lives now in San Rafael.
William Homer Barbour, the eldest son, married Helen
O'Rear in modesto in 1922. He ~ well known for his con-
-23-
PAGE 32 Show Image
tinued expansion in the service station and oil business.
He began a servile station at IAhitmore and gy Highway in
1939. His son, LeRoy, joined him in the firm and the tiAlo
of them established the Barbour &enter at Whitmore and mit-
chell Road in 1957. Homer continued in the business there
until his death in 1966. LeRoy and his son, Dennis, are
continuing the family enterprise. LeRoy, a member o~ the
Ceres Lions Club since 1945 and of the American Legion since
1945, was IMith the Ceres Volunteer Fire Department for 20
years and served on the city Planning Commission for 13 years.
Walter Ervin Barbour, after he graduated from Ceres
High, also became involved in the petroleum industry as well
as ranching. He maintained an oil depot in LYlanteca for
many years. He is married to the former Amelia Genasci Gio-
vanetti. They make their home on the old Barbour place in
Ceres. Amelia "millie' Barbour has been busy with community
and club work since coming to Ceres and is especidlly known
for the floral arrangements she makes as a member of memor-
ial Hospital South Auxiliary.
John Henry Barbour, the youngest son of Er Barbour, has
also made his home in the Ceres area since finishing school.
A long-time member of Ceres Lions Club, he has been exten-
sively engaged in farming. HE married the dormer Ova Lea
Oevitt, believed to be the first Goddess of Ceres. They
are now retired and, though keeping up their Ceres contacts1
are living in the 5ierras near their daughter.
8AR~E5 ROBISON - KELLY
At least three families by the name of Barnes have been
well-known in Ceres. The earliest is believed to be the E. C.
Barnes family. Barnes was once manager of the Ceres Creamery
and his name appears often in records of the first few years
of this century. He had a farm on the south side of Service
Road, just west of the highway. The three-story house he
lived in with his family is still, partly, there. The top
story-and-a-half were removed, making the present one-story
dwelling. Barnes married metta Kelly, one of a family that
arrived in Ceres in 1904. Aster his death, metta K. Barnes
ran a boarding house for school teachers in the tiAlo-story
house that is still standing across from the Ceres High School.
Their children were Rex and Weston, both now deceased, and Eva.
Lucy Stone Barnes, a daughter-in-law, is referred to in some
of the early club notes following.
H. Elmo Robison came to Ceres in 1909 and married another
Kelly girl, Winifred. Robison was a Ceres merchant, operating
a grocery store with his brother-in-law, Barnes. He also at
different times had two barber shops, a men 5 store, and a
cleaning and pressing esLablishment. The last store was first
-29-
PAGE 33 Show Image
located in the old Vincent building and later on the west
side of the second block of Fourth Street. A son Robert
has remained in ~eres i~ihere he and his wife Pat have reared
their two sons. H. Elmo Robison~s other son, LAL. E. "Ted"
Robison, became a Boy Scout executive (see Scout story).
BIAN~HI m VORI
martin Bianchi and his wife madeleine were married in
Switzerland for several "ears before he immigrated to Cali-
fornia. Going first to Sa) Francisco alone in the late part
of the nineteenth century, he established a home and sent
for his wife and three children. They first operated a
dairy drive-up store of the type popular in Stanislaus Co.
fifty years later. They left San Francisco to live in Glen
Ellen and were operatinga dairy there during the San Fran
cisco earthquake of 1906.
In August, 1905 the family moved to the Westport area.
Siro, the son, began dairying with his father. He was mar-
ned to Flora Ambrogio whose rather Attiho had come to the
Crows Landing Road in January, 1908. Flora Ambrogio Bianchi
served on the Westport election board for more than 20 years,
and is presently in her eighteenth year of working fQr St.
Jude's Parish. Siro Bianchi had a s~n Siro by an earlier
marriage and a son IYLartin by his marriage to Flora. martin
Bian~hi, son of Siro and grandson of the first martin, con-
tinues to live in the Westport area where he and his uiife
Barbara are rearing their family. martin is currently on the
Ceres Unified School Board and works for a chemical fertilizer
company. Barbara Bianchi is an executive secretary at Cali-
fornia State College, ~tanislaus, has always been involved
with her children9s school iote~ests, and is a member of the
Ceres First Baptist Church.
In 1920, the first Bianchis founded the Swiss Club. which
has been a rallying point for citi7ens of Swiss extraction.
The Swiss Club members are known for their music and yodeling
performances as well as ~ the gatherings they have in Yori 5
Grove. Two Bianchi girls, daughters of martin and madeleine,
married two Yor3s u~ho were cousins of each other. The two
couples donated the land with the eucalyptus grove which be-
came Yori's GrQve. They were Tony (son of Ed Yori) and Celeste,
and Bundy (son of Fred Yori) and his wife Palmera.
BI~S0N
Ceres' first known commercial baker was William Bilson,
a native of michigan and father of tens children. He arrived
in Ceres in 1904 and set up a bakery near the corner of Fourth
and Lawrence where the Bank of Ceres was later built.
-30-
PAGE 34 Show Image
`Aijiliam Bilson bought a farm (now the Boyd place) on
what is now called Don Pedro Road, east of town, and there
the younger children grew up. The youngest son, Cecil, who
was two at the time he was brought to Ceres, also reared his
family of four children on the same farm. The grandfather,
at different times, also owned bakeries in ~scalon and man
teca. Cecil became a baker, too. He worked briefly for lflr.
Zenardi who had become £eres~ baker, and then started his
own bakery in modesto. His ~uttercrust Pies acquired local
fame in Stanislaus County. He sold the business and moved
to eureka in 1948.
Cecil's four children were: Ann, now of Salt Lake City;
Hattie, now of Colorado; Patricia, presently in Eureka, Cali
fornia; and William. William Bilson, grandson of the first
one in Ceres and known as `~Bill", recalls that he and his
sisters all worked after school, assoon.as they were old e-
nough, in their father's bakery. They moved to modesto dur
mg their high school years. Bill Bilson returned to his
home town in 1955 after five years in the Air Force during
the Korean conflict. He and his wife, Betty Gail, a mississ-
ippi girl, have remained here since that time, with their
children an integral part of the community. Bilson's Sport
mg Goods began in 1956 on Lawrence Street and two years later
moved to a new building which he Bilsons still own on the
corner of Fourth and North. After ten years in the latter
place, Bilson confined his operations to his Turlock store,
opened in 1964 in Richland Center there. IYlrs. Bilson has
taught dancing and related arts for eighteen years in the
Ceres and modesto area, often donating her talents as perform-
er and director to community shows. In addition to the studio
in her home, she is a partner in the Dance Factory in iflodesto.
Bill Bilson was a trustee on the Ceres Unified School Board
from 1969-73.
Another son of the first settler of the Bil~on name,
Albert Bilson, had a barber shop in the early 1900e5, located
behind what was then the drug store and is now Florence I~
Dress 5hop, on Lawrence 5treet.
BLAKER
In the latter part of the 19th century, Jesse Blaker
travelled from minnesota to California in a box car with his
son Fred and the family horse, cow, and furniture. mrs. Blaker,
son Ed, and daughter Alice travelled ahead by passenger train.
Eloda C. Blaker, the wife and mother, had a brother, George
Root, who had preceded them to the modesto area and recommended
the climate for her asthma.
A carpenter by trade Jesse Blaker lived six months in
modesto and then purchased ten acres of open land, later
-31-
PAGE 35 Show Image
planted to alfalfa, uiest of &ere5. He built the family home
and barn and fenced the acreage in barbed wire, and then began
building homes for others, going as far away as empire. He
carpentered in those first years for $3 a day and rode to his
job on a bicycle. In the early days of their settling in
Ceres, it was possible to staod at their i&'indow and see across
open space all the way to Hatch Crossing.
Upon marriage, Fred Blaker took over the farm home and
the rest of the fauiily moved intQ the village of Ceres, and
lived in the home on th corner of Fourth and magnolia where
the daughter, mrs. Char1~s (Alice) Loran, now lives. Ed. L.
Blaker moved to modesto when. he married.
Fred Blaker9s son, Jesse Blaker, lived on the home farm
for a time. He is co-founder, with Bene Crawford, of the Tur-
lock Concrete Pipe Co. Fred's daughter was the late Edith
(mrs. August von Oohlen) `rho also lived in the family ~~me
after her marriage. `Aihen Eloda C. Blaker, a native of lAlis-
consin, died at the. age of 77 in 1929, she had lived in Ceres
for 30 years.
SOOTHE
Dyas Power Boothe, usually referred to as 0. Power, came
to Ceres in 1915 and located on land east of Ceres which he
developed to alfalfa and an orchard, on what is now called
Boothe Road. A U. C. Berkeley graduate in mining engineering,
he was a native of Illinois who was reared in IALashington state
and had pursued his mining work in Idaho and nevada.
While farming, Boothe wQrked as a civil and irrigation en-
gineer, and was the engineer in charge when the Ceres sewer
system was first constructed. He took an active part in the
social and civic life of Ceres, serving as treasurer of the
Board of Trade, president of Ceres Center Farm Bureau, and
served an appointment as trustee o~ the Ceres Union High 5chool
board. He had dehydrators in modesto and Keyes and, during
World WanI, the modesto plant prepared rations for the army.
He and his wife had 0. Power Boothe, Jr., Thomas Wheeler
Boothe, and twins margaret (Peggy) and Ferris Boothe who at-
tended Ceres schools in their early years. Peggy Boothe Iflen-
singer has become well-known in recent years as a civic lead-
er in modesto.
BROWI\I
The poultry industry ham bi~n an important part of th~
~2'rming uconomy of the Ceres area for a long time. Today's
modern entarprises featuring mostly white Leghorn hens for
-32-
PAGE 36 Show Image
egg-laying are a ar cry from the days when the Averill bro-
thers had a small farm-yard clock made up of Light BrahmasD
Partrid9e and Buff Cochins, Plymouth Rocks, IAJhite Plymouth
Rocks ~nd Brown Leghorns.
Pioneers in modern chicken breeding were H. L. and Hilda
Brown. Brown had come to California from Nebraska in 1888
and settled in the mountains near Santa Cruz. There he met
Hilda Goertz who had been born there, daughter of a German
immigrant. They settled in Ceres, with her brother Hans
Goertz, in 1908. The Browns set up the Jubilee Hatchery on
the present Hackett Road, starting with 250 brown Leghorns.
They had coal-oil heated incubators with a capacity of 540
eggs each. All of the eggs had to be turned by hand and the
moisture and temperature were also manually controlled. It
was an all-family operation to turn the eggs, in the days be-
fore automation and even the children did a turn at sharing
the task. H. L. Brown was very skilled at the turning, as
was iflrs. Brown, and had an outstanding reputation as a hatch-
ery man.
The hatchery became well-known in central California,
where the hatched chicks were sold. In addition to his hatch-
ery, Brown worked at the Ceres branch of the modesto Lumber
Company until he expanded his poultry operation. It grew to
5,000 breeder chickens, one of the largest individually owned
breeder ranches in the state. Chickens were shown at county
and state tairs. Charles Brown, one of three sons, speaks of
how carefully his mother would groom the show stock, even down
to the claws. mr. and mrs. Brown were devoted members of the
old Congregational Church in Ceres. Hans Goertz raised pullets
commercially on his ranch on Walnut Avenue.
In 19Z5, H. L. Brown installed a 10,000-egg, electrically-
controlled and heated incubator, all the eggs being turned at
once. Earl Brown joined his father in the business and contin-
ued the expansion and modernization. He later moved to his
present location on Esmar Road where he set up a laying opera-
tion. In 1949 he built a feed mill. In the 1960's, in part-
ne~ship with Homer Vilas, he set up an egg-processing plant and
developed the Brown-Vilas mill. The mill was sold in 1974 to
the Grange Company. earl Brown has served, and currently is,
on a number of boards connected with his business. He was a
Ceres Elementary School trustee for 13 years and is presently
on the memorial Hospital Board of Directors. He and his wife
Evelyn have a son and daughter. evelyn Brown has spent many
years in Ceres service club work.
Charles Brown, a poultry nutritionist for Brown-Vilas
Feed mill, worked earlier with his brother earl in his poultry
business. He lives in Ceres with his wife Alice and son, and
both husband and wife are known for their interest in education.
-33-
PAGE 37 Show Image
They are particularly remembered ~or their leadership
in thebond drive which eventually led to the mae Hensley
Junior High 5chool and Ceres High multi-purpu~e building.
Another son o~ H. L. and Hilda Broiun, Walter, lives on the
Brown ranch where he has worked with the poultry business
there.
CABRAL
John Limas came to ~ in He had come from
the Azores Islands with his wife and children. They settled
on the corner of Lockwood Road and IAihitmore Avenue, purchas-
mg their property from the Gross family. mrs. Gross was a
Baldwin, one of the earliest Ceres families who later went
to the Hughson area. A daughter of John and maria Limas,
Flora, married Fernando Cabral after arrival in California.
He, too, had come from the Azores. They lived first on Hatch
Road where their first two children were born. In 1929, the
Cabrals moved to the Lockwood and Whitmo~e location and lived
there the rest of their lives. A son, George, now farms it.
Their children were, besides George~ marie, Carl, Andrew, Dor-
othy, Elaine, Joseph, Betty, and John. John was killed in the
Korean war. marie married John `1ieira and lived in Ceres until
a recent move to modesto. 5he was f'rmerly an active member
of the Ceres Garden Club.
Another daughter of John and maria Limas was Lucille who
married morris Vasconcellos. Her daughter, Adeline, works at
Florence I5 Dress 5hop.
CARTER
Though there are none of his descendants living in Ceres
now, the name of Levi Carter should not be forgotten. Not only
did his eldest child, Elma, name Ceres, but the first buildings
built on the present site of Ceres were th~ granary and ware-
houses of Levi Carter. He had already put another name on the
land when Ceres was named ~he Esmai Station near his home to
the south. Before the station was on the railroad, it was a
watering spot for horse drovers and teamsters.
Levi Carter, a native of New York, was a descendant of the
colonial Carters of `1irginia. He was a lumberman in New York
and Canada and it t&ias in Canada that he married a girl of Dutch
descent, Fanna (called both Fannie and Annie) Eve Shoup. In
1854 they moved to Illinois to farm, but in may, 1~~o Levi
started for California with a wagon train. ethers in the group
were people later associated with Stanislaus County and Ceres3
Benjamin Sanders, his wife, the form8r Diantha Chapin, and his
brother and three sisters. Carter lingered less than a year
-34-
PAGE 38 Show Image
in Nevada and California lookin9 over the land and then he
returned home via Panama to ~et his family. Levi led his
family and a small wagon train in the trek back to ~alif-
ornia in 18~2. While on the way, there was a battle with
Indians at Goose Creek and two men were killed. Upon arrival
in California, the carter family spent a brief time in El
Oorado County and Sacramento County where Levi worked as
a teamster, then bought land eight miles east o~ Stockton.
About 1B~3-~5, Carter acquired land in Stanislaus County
to which he added several times, buying land into the late
80's. He built a house and facilities for stock at the spot
he named Esmar. About 186w, he began what was a fairly com-
mon practice ~or the time with some grain farmers--he stayed
in Stanislaus County for the planting and harvesting seasons
but maintained a home in Stockton, the only sizeable settle-
ment nearby, so that his children could go to school there.
Later, after 1880, he returned to his Ceres place to live
full time and participate in community life. members of the
Carter family were present at the 1895 reunion at Ceres.
Several other people by the name of Carter lived in the
county and Ceres. Some, like Frank Carter, were related. It
is not known if there were others who were. The Chapins were
relatives. Living with the Careers in 1570 was mary Chapin,
later the second wife o~ Benjamin Sanders, above. It is in-
teresting to note that she gave her occupation as teamster.
In addition to being a farmer and land speculator, Levi Carter
was a tanner.
Elma J. Carter, the namer of Ceres and the eldest child
of Levi and Fanna, was born in Canada. She was a teacher and
did not marry until the age of 47. On January 4, 1B~9, in
Ceres, she married Edward Henry Hills of Ceres, a native of
England. Her parents had died in Ceres the previous year,
three weeks apart.
Stanton Lester Carter, the second child, born in New York,
achieved the most notice in his career. After graduation from
Stockton High School in 1871, he came down to Ceres to manage
his father's grain warehouse. Doing this in the vacation
months, he continued to study in Heald's Business College in
Stockton. After graduating in 1874, he began to study law and
was admitted to the bar in 1876. He was a member of the firm
of Carter, Smith & Keniston in Stockton and filled three terms
as Stockton city attorney. In 1894 he was appointed judge of
the superior court of Fresno. In 1903 he established the law
firm of Carter, Ricketts & Oolph, maintaining offices in Fresno
and San Francisco. He ~as also a leader in Republican circles
in Fresno County. He married there and had three children.
melborne B. Carter, the third child, born in Illinois,
came to live in Ceres but it is not known what became of him.
He received land from his father in 1885.
-35-
PAGE 39 Show Image
Roscoe L. Carter, the first of the Carter children to be
born in California, was living in Ceres in ~tober of 1886
when he married Ella R. 5hoemake of "near modesto". She was
the daughter of IAJilliam Shoemake.
The youngest of the Carter children was Aletha Belle.
Her rather was one of the witnesses when she was married to
Frank eugene Noyes, 34, of marinette.~ IAisconsin on September
109 1880 in Ceres. She was 21. There were other Carter trans
actions in the early deed books of Stanislaus County as Levi
and his family bought arid 3Ol~ land.
~ASW~LL CROSS
While not a member o~ one of the earliest Ceres familiesD
Thomas Caswell is an example Df the entrepreneur-farmer who
was able to successfully take advantage of the opportunities
offered by climate, soil and irritation. As did so many who
migrated to California and stayed, he found that the ingred
ients of hard work and business acumen were also necessary.
Thomas Caswell was born in North Ireland, the fourth son
of a family of 13 children. His fatter was a weaver; his
mother the only daughter of a ship's carpenter. The family im-
migrated to Canada when Thomas was two. Largely self-educated,
Thomds worked as a woodsman in Ontario and later in michigan
where he met his future wife, school teacher mary Andrews. The
couple moved to Iowa where he farmed. His three sons estab-
lished a company to manufacture farm equipment there, utiliz-
mg their own inventions. Of the couple's five children, all
born in Iowa, three--Wallace, Henry and Andrew--survived to
adulthood. Andrew remained in Iowa.
In 1901, for health reasons, Thomas Caswell settled in
Ceres on 320 acres of land and immediately became interested
in the cause of irrigation. He is remembered as one of those
whose effective and persistent argument helped toward a suc-
cessful decision for the Lrrigation districts' advancement.
Wallace Ca~uie1l, Thomas' eldest son, was a graduate of the
University of michigan. He started his career as an Iowa at-
torney. He was also co-owner of the family manufacturing co-
pany. He visited Ceres, and was married in Ceres to Jennie
Whitmore, but did not make a permanent move to the area until
1933. After that tiine, he worked with his brother Henry in
developing and managing the Caswell property and that of his
wife. He was active in the Ceres Chamber of Commerce, presi-
dent of the £ali~ornia Canning Peach Association, and a work-
mg part of other civic and agriculture-related organizations.
It is said that he emulated his father's hard~working propen-
sities and that his departure aL~ dawn ~or fields was used as
-36
PAGE 40 Show Image
the signal for some wives and mothers of the village to get
their own men out and at it. Wa11a~e and Jennie Casi~e11 had
no children.
The second son, Henry, who attended Vista £ollege in
Iowa, joined his father in £alifornia in 1905. Before he
bought and developed a ranch west of Ceres in the IAestport
District and became more identified with modesto, he lived
in ~eres, serving on the first library board. He was active
in the methodist ~hiirch here and it was there he met his fu-
ture wife, Helen Cross, the organist. They later were Pres
byterians. Henry £aswell served as a school board member
for Fairview 5chool and was a director in the Federal Land
Bank. Helen, before her marriage, taught music and art in
ITlissouri schools and piano and voice in Ceres and Turlock.
5he was again known in later years in the £eres Study and
Garden clubs.
Two daughters of Henry and Helen £aswell established
homes in Ceres after marriage and reared their families here.
mary, an artist and teacher, married IAiilliam Bucknam who
served on the Ceres High School board and the California State
Board of education. Ruth (mrs. Homer Jorgensen) is known as
a vigorous community worker; before her marriage her occupa
tion was social work. Her husLand, Homer Jorgensen, is an
engineer and has supervised several developments in Ceres.
Another daughter, Edith (mrs. Robert IAiheeler), taught school
in Ceres for a time and is known in county music circles.
In addition to his Ceres land, Thomas Caswell purchased,
in 1915, ~4O acres on the Stanislaus River near Ripon and
deeded it to the Presbyterian Church at San Anselmo to be
used for an industrial farm for homeless boys. Due to lack
of funds for a building, the church refused the property. A
portion of it was then developed for farming but the remainder,
with its large oak grove, wild grape vines, and native plants,
was left in its original state. This last part of the proper
ty is the present Caswell State Park. It was given by the
family to the State ~f California in memory of Thomas and his
two sons who had lived in California, [Alallace and Henry, by
his daughters-in law, mrs. Wallace Caswell and mrs. Henry Cas
i~ell, and his grandchildren, Earl Caswell, mary Bucknam, Ruth
Jorgensen, and Edith Wheeler.
Earl Caswell at one time after his marriage lived in
Ceres. He and his wife, mary Dee, no~ live on the family
farm on Vivian Road, and he is known for his interest in al
mond cultivation.
Helen Cross Caswell was the daughter of John Newton Cross,
a descendant of the William Cross who came to Virginia from
England to serve in Braddock's army in the French and Indian
War. John N. Cross came to Ceres in 1908 from a background
37-
PAGE 41 Show Image
as a teacher in missouri. He WdS a Oraduate o~ mCGee ~o11ege
there~nd had served as superintendent of chool, newspaper
editor and farmer. His lAilfe, Blivia, had also attended mcGee
College. One daughter, Irrs. edwin H. morris, whose husband
was coowner of morris Brothers Of 5tockton and modesto, pre-
ceded them to Californiae mary, another daughter, taught in
Ceres 1909-10. A son remained in missouri to teach at the
Universities of missouri and Chicago.
John Newton Cross taught at Ransom 5chool near modesto
and was principal of th~ srhool at Keyes for several years.
He purchased a farm near Keyes and established the post
office there and served as its first postmaster. He also
built the tirst store in Keyes and served as secretary-treas
urer of the Keyes Creamery. In spite of their identification
with Keyes, mr. and mrs. J. N. Cross maintained their ties
with Ceres for the rest ot their 1iv25 through community and
church activities.
C~ULKIN5
William 0. Caulkins was born in Delaware Co,, Ohio in
1~6O where his greatgrandparents had pioneered. He married
there mary Emma Whittier whose fathe., Philander Whittier,
had crossed the Isthmus of Panama ~o California in 1857. Whit
tier remained in California for nine years then returned to
massachusetts and migrated to Ohio. The Caulkins family
farmed in Ohio and later Nebraska where they read about the
First Baptist Church of Ceres, California and decided to come
join the congregation in 19O~. They drrived on Washington's
Birthday.
The Caulkins and their six children settled on forty acres
in the Smyrna Park tracts an open barley field at the time, for
which they paid all their capital. There was no hotel avail
able so they were guests of real estate agent C. N. Whitmore,
who had sold them their land. They i"emained with the Whitmores
until a portable home could be placed on their property. Gen-
erous members of the community donated furnishings until theirs
arrived from Nebraska by train alonq pith the cattle accompan-
ied by their 15~year-old sons ~sa0 William Caulkins engaged
in dairying and later poultry and bruit raising. Both he and
his wife were ardent church wor~ers. He was a charter member
of the Central California milk Producers. One more child was
born in Ceres.
Grace, the oldest child of William and mary, married
Frank Forney, a Ceres farmer whom she met on the train to
California. He was at that time an agent for the Whitmore
land development company. Asa h~came a hiqh school teacher
after graduation f~nm th~ University ~f California. He was
princij)~l flf 5tPFkton HiLjh 5chFL'~l ~iir thirty years.
PAGE 42 Show Image
mary Faye Caulkins married Dr. N. C. Davis aster her
attendance at U. C. The couple lived in Brazil for many
years uihere Or. Davis did plant research for the Rockefeller
Foundation. When her husband died9 mary Faye returned to
Ceres and , near the rest of her family on Roedin~ Avenue,
proceeded to build a two-story home and plant extensive
grounds iuith tennis courts on which to rear her four young
sons. All four earned doctoral degrees in various fields of
science, and their mother was known for her successful plant
culture, development of new varieties and growing of exotic
tropical plants that many experts said could not be grown in
the central £alifornia area. 5he hybridized amaryllis and grew
and sold gloxinias commercially. In addition to doing most of
the gardening in her extensive yard, even into old age, she
was known to tackle such thin9s as building kitchen cabinets.
Fred Caulkins and his wife still live on Roeding Road,
though they have sold their walnut acreage. Their son Fred
still lives in the area. Their daughter, margaret, became a
nurse. Ellis £aulkins, the third son of William and mary, lives
also on Roeding Road, with his wife, on part of the original
family farm. Their two sons, Ivan and Ralph, live nearby. A
daughter, Nellie, married Stanley Keck.
Nellie, daughter of William, was a nurse until retirement;
she married a mr. Riggs. Dora, the youngest child of William,
was the one born in £eres. She has been a teacher and is marr-
ied to John melugin, a county supervisor in the 1960's. They
grow and sell their own produce at a vegetable stand on the
melugin family property on Roeding Road.
Both the elder Caulkins were strong supporters of the Pro-
hibition Party and mrs. Caulkins was known for her long years in
the W. C. T. U. She was a member of the first Stanislaus County
Superior Court jury in which women were allowed to serve.
* * *
Another Caulkinz family, unrelated, was in Ceres after
World War I. The Earl A. Caulkinses were from Iowa. mrs.
Caulkins uias a member of the Ceres methodist Church where she
sang in the choir; she died rather dramatically while driving
on the highway9 The children were Lois, who married a Nichols
and lived in Nevada; Verna, who married a Denlis of Ceres; Ev-
erett Caulkins, who moved to martinez; Wayne Caulkins, formerly
of CRres; and Kenneth Caulkins who died in 1976in Ceres. Ken-
neth was a naval cadet at St. mary's College.
CRAIG
A 5cotsman, Robert Craig was born in Renfrewshire, Scot-
land in 1859 and was proud of the fact that he was reared 29
-39-
PAGE 43 Show Image
miles froi-n the poet of the Sccits, Bobby Burns. His ancestors
were tradesmen mostly, though his mother's ~ami1y claimed sev-
eral processional men. He learned the trade of blacksmithing
from his father from the age of 16. In 1855, he realized the
f~l~illment of his longing to core to America, spending his
first year in 5an Francisco. The next year he entered the em-
ploy of Averill and Hall, the blacksmiths of Ceres.
After a courtship of three years, he married Viola Ave-
nh. From 1896 to 1900, he served as Ceres postmaster in
addition to his blacksmithing work, and in 1905 he was able
to start a blacksmith shop of his own. He named it "5hady
Neuk", giving it the Scots spelling. Having practiced the
legendary thrift of his forebears, he had surplus capital
soon after his arrival in Ceres to invest in farm lands. He
bought 114 acres on Hatch Road, a mile from Ceres, first grow-
mg grain and later alfalfa for the dairy he maintained. He
and his wife also lived on Fifth 5treet next to the black-
smith shop. The Craigs also called their Hatch Road farm by
the name *`Shady Neuk."
In the late teens, the Craigs sold the farm off in 20-
acre tracts, part of which is now the Claude mcKnight home
and farm. Craig also owned several lots in Ceres besides his
residence and shop. In 1907 he bought 20 acres of figs when
that industry was first established n Smyrna Park by the Rev.
Dickinson, and did with it what so many speculators have done
ever since--he sold it in two ten-acre tracts three years
later.
Though the Craigs had no children, they were known for
their hospitality and interest in the children of others. He
was a trustee of the high school after it began. He said in
1920 that he felt Ceres had become his native place for it
was here in 1899 that he received his final citizenship papers
and was able to vote for the first time in 1900. Craig lived
into the 1940's, well-known in the torn, a small man who never
lost his 5cotsman's burr and gave no hint of the stereotype of
the burly village smithy. He sold his shop to Frank Parr.
CROSS
James J. Cross was known as a stalwart Republican and used
to boast that he had joined the party in 1556 at the time of
its organization. He had voted for Franklin Pierce, the IAbhig
candidate in 1848-52 and in 1~5~ had walked eight miles to
murphy's Camp to cast his vote for Fremont. He said he found
the election board there sitting around a table with the bal-
lot box in the center of it, every official with a revolver
lying by his hand on the table. Cross brought his Irish-born
wife and family to Ceres from Farmington sometime prior to
-40-
PAGE 44 Show Image
the turn of the century. He farmed on land on Whitmore Ave
flue, three miles east of town.
Joseph mcLean Cross, one of the sons, farmed for a num-
ber of years and also interested himself in politics and law.
He graduated from College of Pacific when it was still lo-
cat ed in San Jose. An item in I, The Ceres 5craper" for April
22, 1902 says: *`fflr. Cross has been spending a week among
friends at San Jose where he went to attend the Republican
convention. The Club (the Farmer's Club) will no doubt be
glad to hear a word from him concerning his impressions re-
ceived there, especially of his trip to Alum Rock in the auto-
mobile built for eight."
Joseph m. Cross became the Stanislaus County district
attorney and had law offices across from the court house
in modesto. He married `1eda Goodwin, whose family farmed
in Empire but who had owned a large farm at one time on chit-
more Avenue. One of Joseph Cross' two daughters, Evelyn (mrs.
m. R. Harris), lives in modesto as does his widow.
George H. Cross, the other son of James J. Cross, and
Thelma Jane (Jennie), the daughter, never married. 5he was
a nurse and remained on the family farm with George. The
farm was sold later to the O1s~n family whose grandson, Tom
Parks, now farms it.
OOOLITTL~
In 1909, Ralph C. Doolittle took his $300 capital and
invested it in stock and fixtures for a confectionery store
on Lawrence 5treet between Third and fourth Sts. From this
small beginning he developed his store into a variety store--
books, stationery, office supplies, toys and novelties, as
well as confections and a soda fountain. He later also had
billiards in it.
A native of massachusetts, Doolittle was the son of a
carpenter, Augustus Albertus Doolittle, and his wife, IYIargaret
~. The family moved first to Detroit, then to Oakland, Cali-
fornia to which older children had come some six years before.
Ralph Doolittle became an expert in the tea business but the
1906 earthquake and fire caused his move to Ceres in that year.
He operated a 22-acre dairy farm with his wife and mother be-
fore starting the confectionery store. He had married Sadie
Harvey in Oakland in 1900.
Doolittle served for five years on the sanitary board of
Ceres and was an active supporter of the bond drive in the
sewer construction plans for Ceres in 1920. He was also known
for his work with the Red Cross and war loan drives. The Ooo-
littles had one child, Dorothy Frances, who graduated from
Ceres High School. The Doolittle store was a gathering place
-41-
PAGE 45 Show Image
for young people and was used by many for courting and making
dates. Large empty bread boxes made of wood, with rope han-
dies, used to serve as benches for the girl-watchers. The
boxes were set outside to await pick-up by the baker.
For several summers preceeding tAiorld War I, a teen-aged
nephew or Doolittle came down from Oakland to work in the
store, and many in town grew to know him. He was James Har-
old Doolittle--Jimmy Doolittle, as he has always been called.
He became one of the most versatile figures in U. S. aero-
nautics, graduate o~ U. C. and m. I. T., but best known as
the leader of the raid ag~in~t Tokyo on April 18, 1942.
I*An irrigating ditch on the Dr. evans ranch broke
early Tuesday morning, with the result that the
Hughson Highway, First Street and the alley an~
lots around that part of town were flooded with
several inches of water. The flood waters also
found their way down to the corner of Second and
magnolia where it ran into the storm sewer.
II II
Ceres £ourier , August 1, 1935
Or. Evans, usually referred to a~ **old Doc Evans", was
C. ~. Evans, m. 0., an Alabaman who came to Stanislaus County
in 1559. After graduating from the University of California
in 1581, he set up practice in modesto with Or. S. m. YicLean
and had patients spread over several counties. He had land
near Ceres, on part of which, fittingly, memorial Hospital in
Ceres now stands. evans fload is named for him; the home in
the grove of trees to the north of the hospital grounds is
where his home was located. He owned, with Leslie Whitmore,
the first Ceres Creamery which was destroyed by fire in 1904.
Evans was known primarily as a surgeon. Lewis Publish-
mg's 1592 history of Stanislaus County gives hi~ the follow-
mg testimonial: teOr. Evans has performed many of the most
difficult and dangerous surqical operations, such as excision
of the hip joint and amputdtion of the limbs, during the hot-
test summer weathers with perfect success, thus practically
demonstrating the fact that the hot weather of the San Joa-
quin Valley is no barrier to perfect surgical success. II
(3A~RISON
The Garrison brothers, butchers, arrived in Ceres in
June, 1902 with their families. They succeeded A. B. Ford
and Son in the butcher shop, th. Fords having moved to mon-
terey County. Jason C. Garrison and his wife martha, while
living in Lebanon, missouri, had seen an advertisement in
the *`Pacific Baptistue of a butcher business for sale in Ceres.
-42-
PAGE 46 Show Image
He got together with his brother, C. C. Garrison, tAiho had gone
to Auburn, £alifornia9 and they pooled their funds for the
purchase, aided by a $150 loan from C. N. Whitmore.
The sale price included a team o~ horses and a wagon, to
gether with an old-style meat cooler and all equipment to run
the shop. The cooler was a box with a tank of water on top
and burlap sacking which hung down in the water and over the
sides of the box. The burlap absorbed the water as it evapm
orated and therebv cooled the meat. Usually meat w~s but
chered in the evening and sold the next day as the cooler was
for very temporary storage only. From the beginning, the Gar-
rison brothers had a meat delivery wagon, driven by J. C.'s
son Lowell as soon as he was old enough. It served the farm
homes from Hughson to the San Joaquin River. Good T-bone
steaks sold for 1O-15~ each; soup bones and liver were usually
given away for free. The many bachelor farmers around in
those days were often working in the fields when the meat de
livery case by, so it was the custom to leave the meat order
and the money for it in the mail box. A Ford truck supplanted
the wagon when automobiles became common.
The Garrisons later built a new building which has been
used since by several other businesses, including the Ceres
Food market and Joe 8erg's ClLthing. The Garrisons themselves
branched out from just a meat business to a grocery store.
The J. £. Garrisons were, as one would expect from the
first paragraph, faithful Baptists. They built, for $1~1OO~
the house on the northwest corner of Fourth and North, later
owned by Vinnia ITlcGarvey and lived in for many years by banker
Arthur Harris and his wife. The J. C. Garrisons had six girls
and three boys, of whom Lowell, ruby, mildred, Hazel, Lulu,
mamie and Helen survived their parents. Lowell is perhaps best
remembered in Ceres. He was president of his 1914 Ceres High
School student body. After World War I, he became the chief
deputy In the Stanislaus Co. tax assessor S office for more
than ten years, and later became the assessor. Lowell and his
wife Leona acquired the home on Fifth Street where she still
lives and iuhich used to be the barn for the Gillette Hotel.
When the hotel was moved to Hughson, Dan Campin moved the barn
to its present site and remodeled it into a dwelling. Leona,
a native of Iowa, served as Ceres city clerk from 195276, re
placing William Romesha. J. C. Garrison's other children set
tled in various parts of northern California. He retired from
his business in 1940 and died in 1953.
C. C. Garrison and his wife margaret had a son, Ridgeley,
who no longer lives in Ceres, and other children. They lived
in the old Averill home on Fourth and Lawrence until it was
moved away. C. C. was known as ILumee and was of a jovial nat
ure9 He brouqht out candy and gum to fill a sackfull when
families came to pay their bills. many customers spent then
the equivalent of about a week's wages on their month's food,
-43-
PAGE 47 Show Image
a greater proportion than is usual now. Lum and his brother,
called "Jase", mere known by the children for the free wieners
they gave away, and by all in town for the bucket of ice water
in summer, complete with communal dipper. Lum Garrison built
several homes in Cere8: the *`Lynda Sperry house" on Fifth St.,
the "Lane house `I at the corner of Fifth and Lawrence; and the
"merrill house'9 ~t the corner of Lawrence and Seventh Sts.
~ butcher named Petty and another called Hildreth had
shops across the street from the Garrisons. The building on
Joe \1incent's property, called "Bye Petty~s store", uias later
moved to Sixth 5Lreet by ~hp present water tower there and was
used for storage by the water company.
GARTIN
James Gartin organized and set up the Ceres branch of the
modesto Lumber Cofnp~ny in October, 1903. He took an interest
in ~eres politics and progress and serves on the first city
council. About 1920 he went to modesto and began his own yard
which he operated until his retirement. It iuas the Stanislaus
Lumber Yard, now owned by modesto Lumber £0. His son, Bert,
owns and still operates the Home Lumber ~o. in Turlock. Bert
grew up in £eres and has a store of accurate reminiscences of
£eres as it was before World War I. He is married to Faye Gar-
tin, for many years music supervisor for Stanislaus County
schools and well~known to Ceres teachers.
GONORI NG
Though the Gondring family did not move to Ceres until
1912, many members of it have had an impact upon the commun-
ity's progress. The first Ceres Gondring, "Judge" John IYI.
Gondring, was justice of the peace in Ceres Township and the
judge of the recorder's court of the City of Ceres.
John m. Gondring had had a distinguished career before
arriving in California in 1905 for his health. A native of
Illinois, he grew up on a farm in Indiana and became a teacher
after finishing Northern Indiana Normal School. He returned
to school for a law degree and practiced law for a number of
years in Nebraska. He was elected to the office of prosecuting
attorney for Platte County and in 1896 was selected by both
Democrats and Populi~ts as candidate for the Nebraska state sen-
ate. He was elected and received the following tribute from
his fellow senators; "Senator Gondring is . . . one of the
most arduous workers, both on the floor of the senate and in
the committee room, is recognized as an authority of weight on
matters of general discussion, an excellent debater and is un-
tiring in his labore. .
-44-
PAGE 48 Show Image
When John and Dillie Gondring were living in the 5an Jose
areaD they heard of land for sale in ~eres and came over to
purchase the land on Fowler Road which is this year being pre
pared for a new subdivision. The walnuts which still remain
on the property were planted when the Gondrings came and the
family speak of how John Gondring carried water for them (the
irrigation ditches not yet completed), by bucket, walking from
the family home on Whitmore Avenue.
Judge Gondring and his wife had seven children of whom
six lived to adultIoL1~~ Nettie, who married C. H. Hansen, a
contractor and conbtruction business owner, was a graduate of
San Jose State Normal and the mother of three children, of
whom christian H., Jr., also in construction, still lives in
£eres. Nettie now lives in modesto. Frances £. [3ondring and
the sister with whom she is most often associated in memory,
Florence L., both graduated from San Jose 5tate, also. Frances
taught manual arts in San Jose schools at first af8d Florence,
who also attended Columbia University later, began as a home
economics teacher in Stockton High School. Frances and Flo
rence, after their retirement prom teaching, returned to £eres
to take over their portion of the family farming interests and
to involve themselves in club activities. They travelled fre-
quently and widely in the 1950's and 196()'s. The new city li-
brary is the memorial tribute t f Frances to her sister. Fran-
ces continues to maintain an active interest in city affairs
and the Women's Club.
Augustus C. and Alfred Al. Gondring, two of John, Sr.'s
sons, were both in World War I service and farmed in Ceres.
They did not marry. Al Gondring developed and expanded the
family farms and is best remembered for his interest in the
American Legion. He remained for some years in the U. S. Naval
Reserves. The new wing of the Ceres Legion Hall is the result
of a memorial gift for him from Frances, his sister.
John m. Gondring, Jr. also was ~ farmer, south of Ceres
on Gondring Road, but is best kr~own as a Ceres postmaster. His
wife, the former margaret Palmer of Texas, developed a reputa-
tion as one of the leading turkey growers in the valley in the
30's and 4O's~ She hatched and selected her own hens and im-
ported the broad-breasted `atoms" or ~~gobblers". Jack Gondring,
as he was called, became postmaster of Ceres in 1933. Their
son, Robert, worked with his mother in the turkey business
for many years. He now farms on morgan Road and has as one
of his hobbies the raising of rare types of water fowl. He
has been a champion trap shooter for years, winning trophies
in western and Pacific areas. The daughter of Jack and m8rg
aret Gondring, IYIarian (mrs. James Sanders) lives in modesto.
Her son, Timothy, now lives in the home place on Gondring Road.
Jim Sanders grew up in the Ceres area; he is retired from an
equipment rental business. A brother, Jerry Sanders, is also
known in Ceres, especially for his past interest in the Ceres
Lions Club.
-45-
PAGE 49 Show Image
HACKETT
Daniel Hackett was born on the old Hackett hDmestead
at Hackettstown, ~ew Jersey which was named for the family.
He served in the Civil War from Ohio in between tries to
California. The second trip was made in 1q76 and he went
to Hanford where he remained the rest of his life.
John, son of Daniel, came to California five years a-
head of his father and settled first at merced, then at Han-
ford where he became in~jlved with the ~usse1 Slough-rail-
road controversy. He and his wife Lois had twelve children,
of whom the eldest was William Je Hackett. William began in
the dairy business in Kings County and in 1902 located half
a mile west of Ceres on 40 acres of raw, grain-stubble land.
He levelled and checked it and sowed it to alfalfa and began
raising pure-bred Ouroc-Jersey hogs, peaches and apricots.
Greatly interested in cooperative movements for marketing
farm products, he was a charter member of milk Producer 5
Association of Central California and was president of the
board of directors four years after its organization.
William Je Hackett was married in Hanford to Gertrude
Fellows. They had seven children: Lester who ranched near
Ceres; Claire who worked with his fa+~her on the Ceres ranch;
Fannie who married Oscar mall and lived in Ceres; Dorothy
who married George mckenzie and lived in the old Craig home
on Fifth and Whitmore; Lois who married a Smith and lived in
Ceres; Dwight and Phillip. The Hacketts were members of the
First Christian Church. Three generations of the Hacketts
were veterinarians. The present generation has continued to
be active in agricultural organizations, including high school
F. F. A. work.
HA~
mrs. Katie Ham came to Ceres in August of 1910. Her
husband, who was a miner from cornwall, England, had died
of miner I5 consumption ir 1908 after an illness of two years.
Their three children were still living at home when mrs. Ham
arrived in town--Will was 21, Allen was of high school age
and Pearl was in grade school.
mrs. Ham was also born In England and had come with her
father to the United States in the early 1860's. He, too,
was a miner and worked in the mines at Soulsbyville which
was settled by Cornish miners. After she came to Ceres,
Katie Ham ran a boarding house for teachers.
Will Ham married myrtle 8aldridge in Ceres where they
reared their family and lived for the remainder of their
lives. Ham operated the Ceres grocery Store with his brother
-46-
PAGE 50 Show Image
in-law, Wayne Baidridge, on Fourth 5treet. Will and IYIyrtle
had three children. Their son Gordon, a former £eres High
School trustee, lives in the Ceres district still and is
knotun for his fine photography and his studio in modesto. His
older brother, Phillip, is also a photographer, having begun
as a combat photographer in World ~ar II. He has achieved
some fame through having worked with Walt Oisney Studios.
Ooreen Ham, the daughter, is married to a physician.
mrs. Katie Ham was married again in her later years here,
to a mr. middleton. Her first husband was J. H. Ham. Their
son, Allen, attended Stanford in 1917 at the same time as
Jessie Wood Crombie.
HANS Corn
The Hanscoms were Tflaine relations of the Averill family
and had preceded them to £alifornia by some years, coming in
the 49'er days. Josiah Weston and Amanda Hanscom lived in
various places while he tried his hand at first mining, then
the cattle and sheep business, and finally general farming
in San Joaquin county, at Atlanta. The family came to £eres
around 1675, ahead of the Averills.
Josiah W. Hanscom had taught a country school in addition
to farming and saw to it that all of his children had an un-
usually good education for the time. There were seven of them:
George T., Nathan C., Bion 8., Si Livingston, Ned B., Elma who
married Chas. W. Kirkwood, and Robert H. George T. Hanscom
completed his education at San Jose State Normal and taught
for 43 years from Bakersfield to the Oregon line, including
a number of years in Stanislaus County. He retired in 1916 on
a teacher9s pension and went into the poultry commission busi-
ness.
Nathan C. Hanscom also nraduated from San Jose State and
taught school, worked for newspapers in Seattle, Stockton and
other parts of Calif~~nia, finally settled at farming and the
commission business with his brothers.
The most interesting and also the most controversial of
the Hanscom family was Si. After San Jose State, he tried
his hand at teaching around the county and then went into the
newspaper business in modesto. For a time he taught in part
of the year, worked in the harvest field, and ran the news-
paper on the side. By 1892, he had been involved in twelve
lawsuits, mostly for libel, of which he had won ten, lost one
at $1 damages, and had one undecided. His newspaper was the
modesto morning Herald, Republican in its politics, and Si
Hanscom as editor minced no words when he wrote, especially
when the words were aimed at the modesto News Oemocrat. Not
only was he a Republican in a strongly Democratic town, but
-47-
PAGE 51 Show Image
he (remember his cousin was Allura Ulch and he had grown up
in Ceres) made the paper a strong defender o~ temperance at
a time when the JYlodesto liquor question was being decided.
Some of his strong words were directed at the city and county
governments9 with some justification--his Democratic rival
got all of the city and county printing IAiork, despite the
fact that the gerald was sometimes the louiest bidder.
Things got livelier. The editor, uiho was spoken of as
being "of Ceres", had his life threatened and began going a~
bout armed. Once, it is said, he shot himself in the leg
when the self-cocking revolver went off in his overcoat
pocket. Si always named names and used most specific lang
uage. In 1889, he accused the chairman of the board of su
pervisors of being a figurehead for another politician. A
week later the son of the chairman entered his office and
shot at his head, but Hanscom threw up his hand and altered
the aim so that the bullet went into the wall. In the ~x-
citement a passerby on the street yelled "Fire" and the
firebell and whistle were sounded. Naturally, this and a
later lawsuit with a judge he had accused of ballot box fraud
made good material for his rival newspaper.
After Si Hanscom retired from the modesto newspaper turm
moil, he went on to become a prominert San Francisco business
man.
HANSON
The John H. Hanson family arrived in the Ceres area in
1903, coming from a homestead in Oregon with their friends
and relations, the Anthony morgan family. mr. Hanson, the
second of ten children, was born in Kansas in 1575, the son
of a wheelwright, Charles Hanson. Charles Hanson had immi-
grated from Oenmark and married Angeline Scott, a New Yorker.
mrs. John Hanson had been Laurine Katterine Ipsen, born in
Denmark a~d a niece of the iflorgans.
The Hanson and morgan families purchased land adjacent
to one another, west of Ceres, and were engaged in farming
and dairying. IY'r. Hanson was also a carpenter by trade. He
and morgan, for some time, had horses shipped from Oregon to
Stanislaus County and broke them to harness before selling
to farmers in the area. In 1921, morgan retired and John Han-
son exchanged farms with him, taking over morgan's larger acre-
age.
The Hanson family attended the First Christian Church in
Ceres and the mother kept up her interest in the family's Dan-
ish heritage through her membership in the Ladies of Dania
(Oania Hall) in modesto. John and Laurine Hanson had two
children, Charles Henry and Clarence IYIorgan. Clarence is best
-48-
PAGE 52 Show Image
known as Jud9e Hanson of the modesto municipal Court where
he served for nineteen years. He has a daughter who lives
in Sonora and a son who is a druggist in Santa Barbara.
Charles Hanson, known so lone to the community o~ £eres
as ~ that his name is seldom written or printed any
other way, continued farming on the gamily acres, converting
them to almond orchards. He and his wise Zeipha still live
there in the home they moved into when married nifty years
ago, though they r~r.ently sold the farm. Their son, Or. James
Hanson, is a science professor at Stanislaus State College,
and a daughter, June (Iflrs. Gerald Schockmel), lives in Sunny
vale. The Hansons have three grandchildren.
Charley has long been a leader in the Ceres \1olunteer Fire
Department, active in the Ceres Lions Club, and has a record
of many years as trustee on both the Ceres Elementary and Ceres
High School boards, a total of seventeen years on both boards.
He also served several terms on the Stanislaus County Schools
board. Zelpha, whose parents, the George Swaggertys, came to
Ceres in 1Y12, is active in the Ceres methodist Church. She
served four terms as president of the elementary school PTA.
Both of the Hansons are active Elks Club members.
Zelpha Hanson's sister, Obrothy Swaggerty IAJilhite (mrs.
Richard Wilhite), lives in Ceres where she and her husband
have reared their familyRobert, now of Piedmont; and Delorris
(mrs. Dennis Parrott) of modesto. They havetwo grandchildren.
HARP
The spot where the Tidewater Southern Railroad crosses
Service Road west of Ceres used to be known as Harp Station.
The large home and warehouse, still referred to locally at
times as the Sisk Warehouse, are now part of the Stanislaus
Farm Supply (Stanislaus Farm Bureau). They are located on
what was once part of the Harp ranch and that portion of Ser
vice Road was once referred to as Harp Road.
T. 0. Harp, a Tennessee native, came,as so many did,
from San Joaquin County to~Stanislaus. He and his wife,
Elizabeth, had five children and came to the area west of
Ceres in the ~ By 18~4, T. 0. Harp had 2,800 acres,
his son Thomas had 320 acres and brother William had 2,OOu.
By an earlier marriage T. 0. (Thomas David) Harp had three
children.
Thomas J. Harp, the son, l8ter took over his father's
farm. He married in Stanislaus County a native of Wisconsin,
Elma mcCumber. They had two children, Lola and Joseph. Tho
mas Harp played a major role in the early development of the
Turlock Irrigation District.
49-
PAGE 53 Show Image
liATCH
The man who put his name on that has become one of the
major thoroughfares south of the Tuolumne and became wealthy
in his land speculations and farming enterprises started life
in Vermont, son of a whip maker. He ran away from home to
Boston where he earned enough money as a shoe clerk to book
passage to San Francisco via the Isthmus of Panama. Arriving
in California at the age of nineteen with one silver dollar
in his pocket, he eventually walked to the Stockton area and
then found his way to ~ gold fields.
Ephraim Hatch was able to save enough from his gold mm-
mg to buy six horses and a wagon. He used them to haul prom
visions for miners, concealing his day's receipts (in gold
dust) in a slit of the blinds on the horses I bridles. He mar-
ned Carolina matilda Horn i,', 1559, and about that time pre-
empted a section of land cornering on Crows Landing and Ser-
vice Roads. Some years later, they received title by U. S.
Government patent. Three children were born to them: Herbert
mavro (called Bert), Amos, and dora may. Amos died at the age
of 19 and is buried in the Ceres £et~etery.
John Service and ~phraim Hatch became joint owners in
half a township in madera County and it was still in both fam-
ily's names until recent times. ~phraim and his family were
well-known in early Ceres and it was ~phraim who acted as Pre-
sident of the First Annual Ceres Reunion in 1595 and gave the
welcoming address. After he moved away, John Service acted
as his agent as well as partner in farming operations.
As evidenced by a paid-up "Flat Note" in the family pos-
session~in the amount of $50,000, ~phraim together with another
$10,000 had plans to purchase Catalina Island for grazing pur-
poses, one of his most ambitious schemes. However, it is
claimed that a second inspection trip of the property in rough
seas caused him to become so sea-sick that he changed his mind.
Instead, he bought a former Spanish land grant of twenty thou-
sand acres near San Luis Obispo, known as the Santa Isabella
Ranch. In a short time h~ sold the property, doubling his
money, and not long after retired to San Jose where he lived
directly across Lhe street from the then location of University
of Pacific. At one time he owned part of the university's
grounds.
Herbert m. "Bert" Hatch continued to live in the Ceres area
and to rear his family herea Warde, Hazel, Herbert and Raymond
Ephraim Hatch. Their home stood on one-half section bordering
Richiand Avenue on the east, IAIhitmore Avenue on the south, mor-
gan on the west1 and Hatch on the north. then the Southern
Pacific Railroad (thin called the Central Pacific) cami through,
it acquired a right-of-way diagonally across this half-section.
The house they lived in was, in large part, the school used by
Cer~a betore 1587.
-50-
PAGE 54 Show Image
* -x;--
-4--
,`-- ;--¾
;
D.K. Woodbridge-T;omas
Caswell lome, on w:iitmore
at 6th Street.
½
~ +A~
~> ~ ½¼;$½ ~
~ ~ ~
~ ~
~
Clinton N. Whitmore~iome1 on
5th Street.
~,: ~
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
~ ~ ~
Case home on Roeding Rd.
~
~ ~
~ ½ ~
~ ~¼ ~ ~ ~
~ ½
PAGE 55 Show Image
;; 4
+:
Daniel ~ home 2928 5th Peter Kana some on 5t~i Street, said
Street,First :~ouse in Ceres. to be the 3rd house built in Ceres.
~
/~
~,
~
~ 4 ~ ~ 4
~ ~
~ -` ~ ~
<` ~ ~
~< ~
Levi Carter-Homer Vilas Sr., original Front view Carter-Vilas home.
portion built Ca. 1865.
~ ~
~
\ ~
,; ~ ½4(¼~*~\~~ ~
4; ~~**4, *~~&`~½, ~`
*
* *
.4 ~ ~* **
~*
~ ~
Warren S. Rollins home 5th Street at Fox Grove Baptist Church picnic in
Park. 1919, Dorot;iy Doolittle, Hazel
Garrison and Marge Wuhutmore.
PAGE 56 Show Image
HAIAiKINS BRYANT
The present La Casitas ~obi1e Home Park on Fowler Road
was formerly the home and farmsite of Rees and Verna Bryant
who came to £eres in 5eptember, 1918 and settled there.
mrs. Bryant was a daughter of Richard and Anne Hawkins
and the Hawkins came the next year after the Bryants and
bought adjoining land. The Hawkins family came from Idaho,
though they had lined in Oklahoma Territory early. There
are two Hawkins sons, Albert who left Ceres early, and Arch-
ibald who commuted to his parents ranch from San Francisco
until 1972.
Rees Bryant was born in Kentucky but moved as a small
boy to Idaho where he met his future wife. The Bryants
have a son Arden who lives in San Diego and a daunhter, Anna-
belle, married to Donald Newkirk. The Newkirks live on Es-
mar Road.
HEL5L~Y
The Helsleys are an example of a minister's family that
stayed to become a real part of the community instead of hav-
mg to move away after only a few years as so many do. They
came to £eres in ITlay, 1899 when Je m. Helsley took over the
pulpit at the First Baptist Church. He saw the congregation
through the fire which destroyed the church and helped organ-
ize the rebuilding.
5tanton K. Helsley, the son, was postmaster for thirteen
years in £eres, then served as justice of Ceres Township. His
son was 5heldon Helsley, a Baptist evangelist and minister.
Carol Helsley Cochran, daughter of J. m. Helsley, lives
now in modesto but, uiith her husband Reid, is a part of Ceres
church and club life. By an earlier marriage to Harold Brooks,
Carol Cochran had t~~ree sons--Leslie, Vernon and Edward. Les-
lie Brooks is secretary of modesto Irrigation District.
HOLITI
Hans P. Holm and Elm martins Alfons were born in Denmark
and came to this country from the village of Gudhjem on the
island of Bornholm. Hans Holm had left the island earlier to
go to England to work at building. There he learned English
and then returned to Denmark to get his wife-to-be and travel
with a group to America.
As was the custom of so many affianced couples, they tra-
velled separately as it was simpler to enter the country that
-53-
PAGE 57 Show Image
`uay. Arriving in New York, they travelled to California by
train and, for some reason, were routed through £anad~, caus-
mg some confusion with immigration authorities. It was in
December, 1907, during a money panic.
Upon arrival in Ceres, they were met at the station by
George Hall, the blacksmith, who made a practice of going
down to meet the train. He walked the couple out to Fowler
Road to show them the way to the home of the reverend Peter
Hansen. The Rev. Hansen had known them in their village
where he had been a minister and he served as a focal point
for newcomers prom Denmark. Hans Holm went to 5an Francisco
to work and save for a year while his bride-to-be worked in
IYIodesto. At the end of the year they were married and be-
gan a home in Ceres, buying land north of Hatch Road.
myrtle Holm Price says that her parents had always in-
tended to return eventually to Oenmark. Her mother esp~.cially
missed the beauty of the ocean and forests when it was con-
trasted with ~eres' dry and dusty summer. She had been a
dressmaker and had taught sewing in Oenmark in her home over-
looking the harbour. Nevertheless, the Hoims remained in
Ceres and lived the rest of their lives here. They kept up
their Oanish contacts at first1 mrs. Hoim being a charter mem-
ber of the Oanish Baptist Church which was organized in 1Y16
in modesto. Later they became members of the Ceres First Bap-
tish £hurch. They were also members of the Dania Club.
The Holm children were, in