Читать книгу History of Fresno County, Vol. 4 - Paul E. Vandor - Страница 23

A rancher who has had a valuable experience both in developing his own properties and in assisting other ranchers to develop theirs, and who, retired and able to place his savings at the disposition of those who need them, is still helping others to succeed, is E. B. Sweezey, who resides at 2946 Grant Avenue in Fresno, to which comfortable headquarters he withdrew, after years of strenuous exertion, in July, 1919. He was born on Long Island, at Peconic, near Greenport, in the eastern county of Suffolk, the son of Samuel Sweezey, a native of Middle Island, the same county, and the grandson of the Rev. Azel Sweezey, a Presbyterian minister, who farmed 400 acres of land on Long Island. Samuel Sweezey married Miss Mary Maria Haynes, who died when our subject was only three years old; she was the daughter of an early settler on the Island, and a member of a family that originally came from England.

Through his second marriage he had one child that grew up, Samuel C. Sweezey, still single and a farmer on Long Island. Samuel Sweezey, Sr., met with an accident to his hand that caused blood poisoning, and he died at his home in his sixtieth year.

Edwin Beecher — for that is the full name of this only offspring from the first union — was born at Peconic, L. I., on October 11, 1853, and attended the public school of his district, where he received that thorough instruction which proved such a foundation for him in later life. He grew up on his father's farm, and when he left home he worked out by the month for a neighbor, resuming work for monthly wages from his father when he was twenty. Meanwhile, between his eighteenth and twentieth years, he had clerked in a general merchandise store at Peconic. He continued to work for a time, then decided to follow Horace Greeley's advice and "Go West." He first located at Edgar, Clay County, Nebr., where he was married to Miss Cora E. Cline, a native of Rochester, N.Y., and the daughter of William B. and Louisa (Garrett) Cline; and in Nebraska he remained for four years. In 1884 with his wife and two babies he came out to the Coast and directed his course to Selma, where Mrs. Sweezey had two uncles named Cline, who were prosperous wheat-growers, and Mr. Sweezey worked on farms. He planted the Tremper vineyard of 160 acres set out to muscats, four and a half miles east of Selma, known at that time as the Cline Place, and that was one of the first large vineyards created east of Selma. For four years, too, he ran that vineyard, and then he took the vineyard of William T. Sesnon and managed the eighty acres for twenty-two years.

During part of this time he engaged extensively in raising wheat, operating a ranch of 1,500 acres now known as the Great Western Vineyard five miles north of Reedley; and although he sold wheat as low as seventy-four cents per cwt., he paid his debts on the basis of 100 cents on the dollar. He did not clear any profit, however, on wheat: so he bought ninety acres directly across the road north of the Sesnon place, and planted that to trees, vines and alfalfa. He also bought and improved other lands and sold them.

From 1904 to 1906 Mr. Sweezey managed 8.000 acres of a ranch of 16,000 acres in Monterey County, inherited by Mr. Sesnon and badly run down; and so well did he handle the estate that he brought it up again to a high state of cultivation. He conducted general farming and raised thoroughbred Hereford and Durham cattle, producing the first herd of thoroughbred Herefords in that part of the county.

Four children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Sweezey's lives. H. C. Sweezey married Amy Sane, a rancher living east of Selma; F. E. Sweezey is also a rancher, and resides on and operates the Sesnon Vineyard, assisted by his wife, who was Ethel Johnson of Selma. Eva Alberta, called Birdie, is the wife of Alvin King, a rancher who lives southeast of Selma. Shirley married Claude Grimes, a rancher northeast of Selma; and resides in that town. Mr. Sweezey owns some fine residential property at Long Beach; belongs to the Woodmen of the World, and is a Republican

In 1916, soon after he bought his present place, Mr. and Mrs. Sweezey took an auto trip to the Empire State and his old home on Long Island. He also visited Florida, and on his wide tour from San Francisco to New York, and Canada to Mexico, he motored through thirty states. None the less, these loyal people were glad to get back to the state of their adoption.