Читать книгу History of Fresno County, Vol. 4 - Paul E. Vandor - Страница 35

One of the early settlers of the West Side who by perseverance and close application has made a success of farming is Hugh Robert McCord, a native of New York, born near Warrensburg, Warren County, December 17, 1850. His father was a farmer at Omro, Winnebago County, Wis., and served in the Fifth Wisconsin Cavalry in the Civil War until he was killed at the battle of Vicksburg, Miss., in 1863. Mr. McCord's grandfather was a native of Vermont and served in the War of 1812, while great-grandfather McCord, who was of Scotch descent, served in the Revolutionary War and experienced the terrible winter at Valley Forge. Mr. McCord had two brothers in the Civil War: Thomas, who was killed at the Battle of Perryville, Ky., while James served through the war in the Twenty-first Wisconsin Regiment, and after the war was an engineer on the Wisconsin River until his death. Mr. McCord's mother died when he was six weeks old, leaving five children, two of whom are living, he being the youngest. He was reared in the family of Mr. and Mrs. Allen Saville, where he grew up on a farm and received a good education in the public schools. In 1865 he came out to Omro, Wis., and lived with his oldest sister. Mrs. Jane A. Nye, who is still living and is now making her home in California.

He immediately apprenticed as a flour miller at Omro learning the trade in the old Burr mill run by water power. In 1868 he removed to Albany. Green County, Wis., where he met with an accident in the mill which necessitated his laying off and he went to school for two years. In 1871 he came gradually west, working in flour mills in Iowa, Nebraska and Kansas.

In the fall of 1874 he came to San Francisco and in the spring of 1875 he came to Murrays mill on the Merced River where he was manager of the mill for two years; then to Dixon, Solano County, where he ran a mill a season and in the fall of 1877 he came to Sperrys mill in Stockton where he was stone-dresser until the spring of 1878, when he accepted the place as manager of the Paradise mills near Modesto, a position he filled for fourteen years. He remodeled the mill, putting in the full new roller process and built up a big business and a good trade.

As early as 1887 he located a homestead of 160 acres on the West Side, where his family resided while he continued in his position to make the money for their living expenses and homestead improvements. In 1892, however, he gave up his position and turned his attention to farming. When he came here there were no water wells in the vicinity and he purchased a well rig in Stanislaus County and brought it to his home and drilled a well, then drilled for his neighbors. Then a sheep man concluded he wanted to summer on the West Side and Mr. McCord drilled a well for him, and then others caught the same fever and he continued in well drilling for twenty-two years, drilling hundreds of wells on the different farms on the West Side. He added to his holdings and now has 500 acres here where he engages in stock-raising.

Mr. McCord was married in Modesto to Miss Mary A. Baldwin, born in Manchester, England, who came with her parents to New Harmony, Ind., and in 1876 came to California. He was bereaved of his wife on July 30, 1919. She was a devout Presbyterian.

Mr. McCord became a member of the Odd Fellows in Waterville, Kans. Then was a member of the Modesto Lodge of Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and now is a member of the Coalinga Lodge. He helped organize the Idlewild school district of which he was a trustee for many years. Politically he is a Social Democrat.