Alameda
County
Biographies
WILLIAM HARRIS
Now living retired from active business
pursuits, William Harris continues to make his home at Pleasanton, Alameda
county, where formerly he was identified with various business interests. Of
Irish birth and English (Quaker) ancestry, he was born December 24, 1825, and
in childhood accompanied his parents to America. After a sojourn of a few years
in Canada, he removed to Wisconsin and engaged in farming on his own account.
From there he went to Minnesota and took up a tract of government land in
Olmsted county, where he worked as a tiller of the
soil for a brief period. In 1863 he removed to St. Charles, Winona county, same
state, where he carried on a mercantile establishment. Ill health forced him to
seek a change of climate and occupation. Selling out his stock of goods and
other possessions, in 1867 he came to California, where he bought a homestead
in Petaluma. After one year and seven months he removed to the San Joaquin plains
in the hope that his health might be more rapidly restored. For two years he
engaged in business and for a similar period lived on a stock ranch in San
Joaquin county, after which he had charge of Hill’s
Ferry Hotel for three and one-half years. On coming to Pleasanton in 1876 he
took charge of the hotel, which he superintended for three years. Meanwhile he
also built the livery stable which for eight years he owned and operated. On
disposing of that property he bought a grain and hay warehouse, which he
conducted with his son, Thomas William for a few years, and then merged the
business into the warehouse owned by Joshua Chadbourne,
continuing with the new organization for several years and then retiring from
business pursuits. The only fraternal organization with which he has held
active connection is the Masonic order, having been identified with the blue
lodge (sic) for many years. During much of his active life ill health
interfered with the success he would have attained had he been more robust, and
now he is quite feeble; yet he has never lost interest in matters affecting the
progress of Pleasanton and has ever been devoted to the welfare of the place.
October 31, 1858, Mr. Harris married
Miss Matilda A. Mitchell, who was born in Kane county,
Ill., August 29, 1839, and at sixteen years of age accompanied her parents to
Olmsted county, Minn., where she became the wife of Mr. Harris. Three children
were born of their union. The only son, Thomas William, now holds office as
deputy district attorney of Alameda county. Among the
lawyers of Oakland he holds high rank, having by sheer force of native ability
and persistence won his way to recognition in a city noted for its men of
culture and intellect. The older daughter, Gretta G.,
died at thirty years of age; and the younger, Lillie, who is a graduate of the
San Jose State Normal School, has taught for nineteen years in the Pleasanton
schools, where she was herself a student in childhood. In religious belief Mrs.
Harris is connected with the Pleasanton Presbyterian Church, where she is loved
and honored for her kindly heart and many benefactions. She is a member of an
old southern family of planters and slave-owners. Her father, Thomas Mitchell,
was born and reared in Kentucky. At an early age he imbibed abolition principles.
When he was nineteen his father ordered him to take charge of
the slaves on their plantation. The work was so distasteful to him that
instead of obeying he left home at once, with his mother’s assistance, and took
up the burden of self-support in a region free from slavery. For a time he
worked on a canal in Ohio and from there went to Illinois. He took up
government land in what is now Chicago. However, the place was merely a swamp
and seemed not only an undesirable location, but unhealthful as well. When he
tried to sell the claim the best offer he could get was a cow in trade. He
accepted that proposition and removed thirty-five miles west to Kane county, where he took up government land and improved a
farm. While there he married Angeline Russell, who was born and reared in Ohio.
In 1852 Mr. Mitchell came overland to California, but after a year in the mines
he returned to Illinois. About 1855 he took up his home in Minnesota, where he
bought farm property. From there he came to California in 1866 and settled upon
a farm in the San Joaquin valley, where for some years he met with fair success
in his agricultural pursuits. During 1873 he returned east and settled in
Missouri, but a year later made his third removal to California, settling again
in the San Joaquin valley. Here he purchased a ranch, which he operated for
some years, but finally sold out and removed to Pleasanton, where he conducted
a small ranch. His last days were passed in retirement from business cares in
Pleasanton. He lived to be ninety years of age, while his wife was nearly
seventy-eight at the time of her death. Both were earnest members of the
Methodist Episcopal Church, and possessed the kindness of heart and hospitality
characteristic of the pioneer.
Transcribed
by: Cecelia M. Setty.
Source: History of the State of California & Biographical
Record of Coast Counties, California by Prof. J. M. Guinn, A. M., Pages 962-963.
The Chapman Publishing Co., Chicago, 1904.
© 2016 Cecelia M. Setty.
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