Butte County
Biographies
HON. JOHN McKEE WARD
HON. JOHN McKEE
WARD.--A man who from personal experience can tell the thrilling adventures
and the romance of the range, and who through his extensive banking operations
in Arizona knows the ins and outs of financing a country while in its
development, is the Hon. John McKee Ward, who was born near Orangeville, on the
Mahoning River,
in Pennsylvania, June 10, 1832, and came to California
two years after the admission of this state to the Union.
His father was James R. Ward, a farmer, who was born in Chenango
County, N. Y., and his mother was
Mary McKee before her
marriage. Both parents died in Pennsylvania.
Six children (five boys and one girl) grew up, but only one is living--the
fourth eldest and the subject of our sketch. A brother, James, was in a
Pennsylvania Regiment in the Civil War, and afterward came to
California.
Two others, Alva A. and Charles, came to west Colorado,
but both are dead.
Brought up on a farm, John Ward
attended the public school of his neighborhood, and when his father died while
he was only sixteen years old, he bought fifty acres
of land and set to work to improve it. He had to toil day and night to master
the task, and the fact of the matter is that the task mastered him, unless one
takes a philosophic view of the situation and finds in his temporary difficulty
the beginning of his success. The work of clearing the ground covered with
stumps and stones proved so great that, at the
end of four years, when he had cut a big linwood
tree, he threw the axe on the stump and said that was the last lick he would
hit on that farm, after which he said goodbye to Mercer County and left for the
West.
He started for Missouri,
but by the time he reached the Middle West, he took the California
fever and joined a company then fitting out at St. Joe. The emigrants had
plenty of horse and ox-teams, and John drove a yoke of oxen, or a half dozen of
them, part of the way, and also had a mule and a horse at his disposal, both of
which he sold when he reached California. As has been said, this trip, on which
John came through all right, was made in 1852, but the party had its share of
adventures. On the Humboldt River, the Indians had
stolen some of the cattle, and John and a man named Jackson Hart started after
them. Arriving at the Humboldt, they found that some of the cattle had been
killed. These he rolled over into the river. The Indians proved again very
numerous, and the young fellows started to get away. Hart went to the left into
the bushes, and there lost his horse and provisions, and was left in a sad
plight, but Ward had a good horse and started to the left up over the mountains
and so attained the level. It was too dark, however, to find his way down the
other side, and he picketed his horse and lay down as best he could to sleep.
In the morning he found the camp about eight miles away. On his arrival he
immediately sent a relief party to Hart, which rescued him and saved his life.
In later years Hart lived near Visalia.
After a trip of four and a half months the party arrived in California,
reaching Hangtown, now Placerville,
about November 1. There Mr. Ward remained two or three months, and in the fall
of 1852 pushed on to Colusa County,
and wintered near the Stone Corral. There he engaged in stock-raising and
cattle-raising on unsurveyed government land, with
wild horses everywhere about; but primitive as were the conditions, and
considerable as were the hardships, the experience proved of the greatest
possible value in developing the young man, who was destined, in turn, to help
develop the country, with which he was casting his lot.
About 1859, Mr. Ward came to Butte
County, and established
headquarters near Central House. He sold beef cattle to Benedict and McGee, and
sold them cattle for their meat market in Oroville. He continued at Central
House, riding about and buying up cattle, and established meat markets in
mining camps. He had eight shops, and he furnished meat to others. His own
butcher shops were in Whiskey Diggings, Onion Valley,
Poor Man's Creek, Saw Pitt Flat, Gibsonville, Allen Flat, Port Wine, St.
Louis, and La Porte. He
bought most of his stock in Colusa, what is now Glenn
County; also much in Butte
and Tehama counties. He purchased a good deal of old John Boggs, who delivered
to him thousands of cattle, and their dealings lasted many years. He also
bought in Honey Lake
Valley and Modoc
County. He drove the cattle over
the mountains to mining camps in this vicinity; and when the camps went down he
quit and started stock-raising.
He made a trip to Oregon with his
family, and while there bought thirteen hundred head of cattle, which he
gradually brought through to California.
He also engaged in cattle-raising on the Humboldt River, in Nevada,
about fifteen miles from Winnemucca, raising hay for several years as well as
cattle, and finally selling out. His brother, Alva, had also been in the stock
business in Nevada, and when they sold their interests
they went to Arizona and together
embarked in the cattle trade there.
In Maricopa County, Ariz.,
they bought the Sunflower Ranch near Tonto
Basin, and there they raised
thousands of cattle. This partnership lasted until Mr. Ward’s brother died,
when he continued to manage the business alone. At one time he had six thousand
or more head, and on another occasion sold two thousand five hundred at one
time, delivering them, with seventy head of saddle horses, at El
Paso, Texas.
Largely as a result of these extensive operations in
live-stock, Mr. Ward became interested from its inception in the National Bank
of Arizona at Phoenix, and since then has continued a stockholder until now he
is the second largest stockholder in that flourishing institution. He was in
the cattle business in Arizona from 1874 until 1906, and
yet all this time he was in the stock-raising business in Butte
County, and made his residence in
Oroville.
There, too, on September 22, 1863, he was married, the gracious
lady being Miss Amanda G. Helms, a native of Enterprise, McDonald County, Mo.,
and the daughter of Houston and Elizabeth (Lane) Helms, natives of Indiana and
Tennessee respectively. In 1857, Mr. Helms brought his family by ox-teams
across the plains to California, and for three years settled in Yuba
County; and in 1860 he came to Butte
County where he was a farmer at
Central House. For many years he, too, was in the stock business, and he came
to have extensive dealings with Mr. Ward. He died May 3, 1917, in his
ninety-third year, his good wife having died in 1914. Three children--two girls
and a boy--were born to this pioneer couple, and Mrs. Ward was the oldest,
having been in her tenth year when she crossed the plains. She went to school
in 1857 at Central House, and after she was married she and her husband
established a home in Oroville, and for forty-five years his headquarters have
been maintained at the corner of Oak and High Streets, where he built a new
house. Mr. Ward's ranch starts at the edge of the town at the southeast, and
continues for several miles, and it contains about four thousand acres, all
nicely fenced in and well watered from springs and creeks. There stock and hay
are raised, the Shorthorn and other high-grade stock predominating. He also has
a ranch of three hundred sixteen acres across the river on the Chico
road. It is excellent plow land, and is devoted to the raising of hay, for
young stock, cows and calves. Two large barns take care of the harvest. He also
has good saddle horses.
Mr. Ward was one of the organizers of the Bank of Oroville, was
a director, and its first president until he had to be absent in Arizona
for some time, when he resigned. After
twenty-five years, on the conversion of the bank to the
First National Bank, he was made a director, and in that capacity he has served
both this bank and the Savings Bank of Oroville ever since. He has also had
some experience as a public official, serving this district as supervisor for
six years, during most of which period he was chairman of the board. He is by
party preference a Republican, and was a member of the state legislature
in 1885.
Five
children have blessed the union of Mr. and Mrs. Ward; Houston C., in Phoenix,
Ariz.; Minnie G., Mrs. Hulme,
resides at San Francisco; George, who lives on the ranch; and the twins,
Estelle, Mrs. Tyler, and Alvah, Mrs. Perry, who lives
at Oroville, the latter having two children, Estelle and Sylvia Perry. On
September 22, 1913, Mr. and Mrs. Ward celebrated their golden wedding. All the
children and grandchildren and many friends were present. Mr. Ward was bereaved
of his faithful wife on June 25, 1917. She was much esteemed and loved by all.
Transcribed by Sande Beach.
Source: "History of
Butte County, Cal.," by George C. Mansfield, Pages 467-469, Historic Record Co, Los Angeles, CA, 1918.
© 2007 Sande Beach.
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