Butte County
Biographies
ALBERT ELERY CRUM
ALBERT ELERY CRUM. – The eldest of
a family of eight children and descended from pioneer stock that always kept in
the van of western progress, A. E. Crum, of Chico, was born in Whiteside
County, Ill., November 15, 1846. His father, John Thompson Crum, was born in
the Buckeye State, lived for a time in Indiana, and, when he was twenty-two,
settled in Whiteside County, Ill. He bought raw prairie land, broke the virgin
soil and farmed until 1863, when he moved back to Henry County, Ind., and
purchased the farm on which he was raised. Later he moved to Coffeyville,
Kans., where he died. He was a strong, hearty, robust and active man. His
father was killed by Indians in Ohio, when the son was but three years old. His
mother then took her children to Henry County, Ind., where she later married
Henry Wick. She was a very remarkable woman. She had considerable medical
knowledge and ability as a nurse, and she was known for miles around for the
success she had in the alleviation of pain and in curing diseases by
administering curative remedies. J. T. Crum married Mary Louisa Pierce, born in
the Hoosier State, where she also died, in 1865. Of the family of eight
children, three are living, A. E. Crum being the oldest.
Reared on the farm, A. E. Crum attended
the district school at Hazel Green, in a schoolhouse made of oak lumber. He
endured privations of the period, became inured to hard work, and remembers
seeing a great deal of the prairie land broken with ox teams. In 1863, he went
with the family to Indiana, where, at Spiceland, he
had the advantages of the high school. His father had a merchandise store at Dunreith, and, when A. E. was twenty-two, he became a
partner with his father and they continued together until 1870. Andrew Jackson
Crum, a California pioneer, went back to Indiana on a visit home, and such
glowing accounts did he give of the wonderful resources of the Golden State
that A. E. was fired with a desire to see for himself. That fall he accompanied
A. J. back to California and worked for him that winter, on Dry Creek. The next
year this enthusiastic young man, with Harvey Crum for a partner, bought a band
of cattle and drove them to Honey Lake Valley, Lassen County, where they were
sold to good advantage that same fall, the young man returning to Butte County
in the fall. With the proceeds of the sale A. E. Crum bought two hundred acres
of land on Dry Creek, which he improved and farmed to grain and stock, with
splendid success.
With his prosperity assured, he found the
need of a helpmate, some one to share his success as well as to encourage him
to greater effort, and in September, 1872, he married Miss Ella Wick. She
was born on the Wick Ranch, the daughter of Moses Wick, a forty-niner in
California, and the pioneer importer of full-blooded Shorthorn cattle in Butte
County. Mrs. Crum was reared on the farm and attended the district school near
their ranch and in Oroville. Mr. and Mrs. Crum continued to farm on
his property until they sold out and moved to Chico, where Mr. Crum started a
mercantile business on Broadway, near Second Street, and carried on the
business for six months, then sold out and went back to the ranch on Dry Creek
and once more took up the life of a farmer. His family had considerable
sickness, due to the breaking up of the new soil, so he moved to Paradise,
where he was engaged in teaming. After the recovery of his family he “pulled up
stakes,” in 1883, and went to Coffeyville, Kans., where he ran a threshing
machine and corn-sheller three years. From there he
moved to the Cherokee Reservation in Indian Territory, and on the Verdigris
River he ran a sawmill, manufacturing walnut lumber,
which he shipped East, some of it going to Europe. Two years later he moved
onto Grand River, where one year was spent.
California was ever beckoning to him and,
in 1889, he packed up and moved back to Butte County and bought some land east
of Oroville, in Pleasant Valley. He erected a good house and improved the land,
set out oranges on part of the land, and three years later he traded the ranch
for a store in Honcut. He ran the store for eighteen
months, when it burned down, and he went back to farming on leased land, and
three years later moved into Oroville. Never content to be idle, Mr. Crum
bought a ranch near Honcut, ran it for a time and
traded it for the Preston Ranch of six hundred acres, which became known as the
Crum Ranch. He prospered and soon bought the Jones Ranch adjoining, which gave
him twelve hundred forty acres of land, and here he improved a fine
stock-ranch, raising beef-cattle for market. His brand, the letter C with a bar
over it, was well known by all stockmen. In 1911, he sold out and moved to
Chico, where he is living retired from all actual labor and in the enjoyment of
a well-earned rest, although still looking after his varied interests. He owns
two residences in Chico, property in Oakland and in Marysville.
The children born of the marriage of Mr.
and Mrs. Crum are: Morris T., a merchant in Oroville, where he is a partner in
the Smith Company; Charles LeRoy, a farmer and
stockman on the Wick Ranch; Ralph Elery, who was
accidentally killed while he was conductor of a logging train, the train
running away down a steep grade, struck a curve, when he jumped, but was struck
by a log and was killed; and Arthur, who is a farmer and stockman of Chico.
Mr. Crum has been a member of the
Christian Church since he was seventeen. He is a trustee and an elder of the
Chico church, to which Mrs. Crum also belongs. Mr. Crum served as a school
trustee of the Wick District and was greatly interested in maintaining good
teachers and in trying to raise the standard of education in the county.
Politically he is a Republican.
Transcribed by Marie Hassard
24 April 2008.
Source:
"History of Butte County, Cal.," by George C. Mansfield, Pages 890-891, Historic Record Co, Los
Angeles, CA, 1918.
© 2008 Marie Hassard.
Golden Nugget Library's Butte County Biographies