Butte County
Biographies
TIMOTHY F. HORNUNG
TIMOTHY F. HORNUNG.—The name of Timothy F. Hornung is vitally connected with the present-day development of Butte County, especially that section in the vicinity of Wyandotte and Bangor, which has felt the impetus of his progressive, energetic and up-to-date business methods. He is a son of J. G. and Magdalena (Ott) Hornung, the former born in Wurttemberg, Germany, and who, on account of his radical political views, had to flee the country in 1848, along with such men as Schurz, Weyland, and other progressives. Eventually settling in La Salle County, Ill., he died on his farm near Ottawa in 1898, survived by his good wife until she answered the final call in 1912, aged seventy-five years, the mother of nine children.
T. F. Hornung, the youngest child in his parent’s family, was born on his father’s one-hundred-forty-acre farm near Ottawa on May 19, 1879, and he is the only one in California of the seven living sons and daughters. He grew up on the farm and attended the district schools of his home locality and the Ottawa high school, from which he graduated. At the time of the death of his father he was a student in the University of Illinois; the death of this parent caused a change in his plans and he turned his attention to teaching school for a time. In 1900 he came to California and in Sonoma County was interested in growing apples, later he joined the forces of the North Western Life Insurance Company at Sacramento, under S. F. McAnear, manager of the Sacramento district. In 1904 Mr. Hornung became director of agencies for the State of California, and it was while traveling extensively over the state in the interests of his company that he became aware of the fact that there was an opportunity to develop water in Butte County. He found that the old South Feather Water and Union Mining Company had a valuable water right and his keen foresight enabled him to see that it was capable of expansion and of much use. In 1909 he located in Wyandotte, Butte County, a section situated in California’s thermal belt and with a reputation unexcelled for olive culture. Here he promoted and organized the South Feather Land and Water Company, incorporating it under the laws of California with a capital stock of $250,000, par value one dollar per share. The officers of the corporation are: L. E. Bontz, president; L. G. Siller, vice-president; S. F. McAnear, secretary; J. S. Gattmann, treasurer, all of Sacramento; these men with J. J. Sinclair, also of that city, constitute the directorate, while Mr. Hornung is the manager of the company.
Mr. Hornung is also manager of the Wyandotte Land Company, organized in 1910, its object being to buy, sell, improve and develop orchards in the Wyandotte and Bangor sections of Butte County. The officers of this concern are: J. S. Gattmann, president and treasurer; James Seadler, vice-president; C. F. Metteer, secretary; these gentlemen, with J. L. Siller and L. E. Bontz, constitute the directorate. The company owned thirty-nine hundred eighty-five acres, of which nine hundred fifty have been sold, and of this acreage about five hundred acres have been developed into orange, lemon and olive groves. Of the three thousand thirty-five acres still owned by the company, forty acres have been set to olives as a demonstration grove. To irrigate this land water has been diverted out of Lost creek, the main branch of the South Fork of the Feather River, at an elevation of thirty-one hundred feet, and brought down in canals, flumes and pipes, a distance of thirty-six miles. The company acquired the rights and titles of the waters from Lost, Pinkard, and Orolewa Creeks, and of numerous other small streams, together with about seventy-five miles of pipe lines, flumes and canals, from the former company. The distribution of this water is through a system of pipes to the ranchers of the district. At the present time the company depends upon stream flow entirely for its water supply, which is sufficient to serve during normal years, some twenty-five hundred acres.
The first canal was constructed in 1853, and water has been used for beneficial purposes since its completion in 1856. The rights of the company were additionally fortified by a special act of Congress in 1866. The company at this time furnish water to about two thousand acres of orchards in Wyandotte and Bangor districts. Sufficient flood waters are available in the streams controlled by the company, to irrigate an additional twenty-five thousand acres of land in these two districts. Recognizing the necessity of water for this large undeveloped tract, extensive surveys of reservoir sites and canals have been made by the company, and one reservoir site capable of storing thirty-three thousand acre-feet of water has been largely acquired by them.
Mr. Hornung is also interested, as a stockholder, in the Wyandotte Orchards, Inc., a close corporation owning one hundred sixty-six acres of land, and of this one hundred six acres are planted to olives, comprising thirty acres of four-year old trees, twenty-eight acres of seven-year-old trees of the Mission variety, and the balance of three-year-old trees; and seventeen acres are in oranges, planted in 1917. Emery Oliver of Sacramento is president of this company, and T. F. Hornung, vice-president and manager.
In 1914 Mr. Hornung was united in marriage with Miss Florence Pollard, born in Los Angeles; she is a woman of culture and refinement. They reside on the property owned by the Wyandotte Orchards, Inc., at Wyandotte. Mr. Hornung is making a success of his undertakings and has given his undivided attention to the development of the business of the companies since 1909. He is a live-wire in the community, thoroughly reliable and trustworthy, and has many faithful friends.
Transcribed
by Sharon Walford Yost.
Source: "History of
Butte County, Cal.," by George C. Mansfield, Pages 1221-1222, Historic Record Co, Los Angeles, CA, 1918.
© 2009 Sharon
Walford Yost.
Golden Nugget Library's Butte County Biographies