Butte County
Biographies
WILLIAM GRANT
WILLIAM GRANT.--Inheriting the national
traits of character of his Scottish ancestry on the paternal side, William
Grant has made many friends by his strict integrity and straightforwardness of
purpose. While not an old settler in the sense of having come to this section
in the days before the advent of the railroad train, he is a resident of many
years standing, coming to Butte County in 1901. His father, James Grant, a
stone cutter by trade, and a native of Scotland, crossed the Atlantic Ocean to
the United States when twenty-eight years of age, spending the first two years
of his life in this country in New York, going from there to Madison, Indiana,
where he married. His wife and two children that were the result of this union
died, and he removed to Jennings, [sic] County, Ind., and again entered the
bonds of wedlock. His second wife was in maidenhood Rebecca Fiffer,
a native of North Carolina. He farmed in Jennings County until 1866, when he
removed to Minnesota, locating fifty miles west of Minneapolis in Meeker
County, where he owned one hundred sixty acres and where he and his wife died.
William Grant was born in Jennings County,
Ind., May 15, 1853, and his childhood was spent on the farm, where he received
a limited education in the public schools, until the age of thirteen, when he
accompanied his parents to Minnesota and became his father’s assistant on the
farm, clearing out the timber and breaking the land. He remained at home,
helping to improve the place, and after the death of his parents bought out the
other heirs’ interest and added more land until he had two hundred forty acres
on which he raised wheat, cattle and dairy cows.
Concluding to visit California, in 1901
Mr. Grant rented his Minnesota home for two years, expecting to return again.
He had long looked forward to California, but believed it to be a country
fitted only for rich people. When he realized the wonderful possibilities of
Butte County’s future and saw the rich soil and beautiful orchards, he
succumbed to the enticement, sold his Minnesota property, purchased a ten-acre
peach orchard and settled in Butte County, Cal. Later he added to his acreage
by purchasing another ten acres across the road on Olive Street. His twenty
acres are principally devoted to peaches, prunes and alfalfa. Nine years ago,
while driving a loaded wagon of prunes in Chico, he was kicked by a horse, fell
under the wagon and both wheels ran over him, the weight of seventy-one hundred
pounds passing over his chest, badly crushing him. His friends thought he was
killed, but he recovered when taken to the hospital, where he came near dying.
He still feels the effects of this accident and probably will as long as he
lives, but he superintendents his ranch and looks after his business interests.
He has a fine orchard and also owns other peach and prune orchards in the
vicinity.
Mr. Grant’s first marriage was with Miss
Mary Toms, a native of Indiana; she died a little over a year after their
marriage, leaving a little daughter, Nettie, now Mrs. Fuller, engaged in
horticulture near Chico. Mrs. Fuller has a son by a previous marriage, Roy
Bogar, who is also interested in horticulture in this
vicinity. Mr. Grant’s second marriage was to Ellen Coleman, who died in
Chico, without issue.
From young manhood William Grant has been
a Seventh Day Adventist, and is a member of the church of that denomination in
Chico. When the church was first organized he was a member of the board of
trustees, and he and Mr. Losee bought the lot and
most of the lumber and helped build the first church of that denomination in Chapmantown. Later the property was sold and the present
church built. While living in Minnesota he was clerk of the public school in
his district for twenty-one years, and instrumental in founding, organizing and
building the first school in his vicinity, District No. 60, Meeker County,
Minnesota.
Transcribed by Marie Hassard
25 October 2008.
Source:
"History of Butte County, Cal.," by George C. Mansfield, Pages
1048-1049, Historic
Record Co, Los Angeles, CA, 1918.
© 2008 Marie Hassard.
Golden Nugget Library's
Butte County Biographies