Butte County
Biographies
LEROY E. GIRDNER
LEROY E. GIRDNER.—An agriculturist
who farms strictly according to scientific principles, and who is so successful
that with irrigation he is able to obtain two different kinds of crops each
year from his choicely improved land, is Leroy E. Girdner,
who was born in Sutter County, Cal., on December 27, 1874, the son of
Joseph Girdner, a native of Kentucky. His mother was Virinda C. Brittan, before her marriage. She came from
Virginia to California across the plains when thirteen years of age. In the
early fifties Joseph Girdner crossed the plains with
ox teams to California when seventeen years old, and mined for a while in
Placerville. He agreed to give Mr. Goodwin, the man he came with across
the plains, one-half of what he made the first year; and true to his promise he
paid him thirty-six hundred dollars out of seventy-two hundred dollars he made
locating and selling claims. Settling in Marysville, he bought land in town,
and speculated more or less in real estate, in early days. He owned the corner
where the Rideout Bank now stands, and he erected a
hotel and ran the same for a time with a partner. Then he sold out and engaged
in farming on the Sacramento River. He was a sheep raiser and an extensive
landowner in Sutter County; and in all that he undertook, he was reasonably
successful. More than that, he enjoyed an extensive acquaintance and made many
valuable friendships, being intimate, for example, with John Bidwell. He was
also a churchman and an advocate of the cause of temperance; and it was largely
through his efforts, time and money that Sutter County was made “dry.” He died
in 1909, when almost ninety years old, about nineteen years after his faithful
wife had passed away.
Leroy Girdner
was educated in the public schools of San Jose, after which he returned to his father’s
ranch in Sutter County and assisted his father and worked as a rancher for
wages. In 1907 he bought his present place in Gridley, which he has greatly
improved. The farm has seventeen acres, and he has a dairy of fifty cows,
delivering therefrom milk and cream to the residents
of Gridley. This, known as the Rose Dairy, he established in 1915. Mr. Girdner also owns two other ranches in the same vicinity.
One consists of twenty acres planted to alfalfa; and the other includes fifteen
acres, also in alfalfa. In one year he cut one hundred three tons of alfalfa
from twenty acres. The land is rich and productive, and is under irrigation. He
rotates to grain and beans, renewing the land from year to year; but he claims
that two good crops of different kinds can be raised on one piece of land each
year, with irrigation.
When Mr. Girdner
was married, he chose for his wife Elizabeth B. McAuslan,
a native of Sutter County, of a pioneer family. Her father, David McAuslan, was born in Scotland, and came to California
across the plains. Mr. and Mrs. Girdner have had
two daughters and two sons. These children are Ryllis
Eloise, Frances Virinda, Joseph William, and
Leroy E., Jr. Mr. Girdner was made a
Mason in North Butte Lodge, No. 230, F. & A. M., of
Gridley; and both he and his wife enjoy a popularity that speaks well both for
them and for the community in which they are so active.
Transcribed by Marie Hassard
04 November 2009.
Source:
"History of Butte County, Cal.," by George C. Mansfield, Pages 1297-1298, Historic Record Co, Los
Angeles, CA, 1918.
© 2009 Marie Hassard.
Golden Nugget Library's
Butte County Biographies