Contra Costa County
Biographies
BEVERLY R. HOLLIDAY
BEVERLY R. HOLLIDAY. A pioneer of 1849 and one of the
oldest citizens of the Alhambra valley, Contra Costa county,
Beverly R. Holliday is rounding out the years of a well-spent life.
He was born in Green county, Ky.,
December 22, 1823, a son of Hiram and Agnes (Lemon) Holliday, and his
parents removing to Whitehall, Ill., in 1825, he was there reared and educated.
At the age of fifteen years he began teaching school, continuing so occupied
for nearly ten years, when, in 1849, he crossed the plains with ox-teams in
company with others seeking the new Eldorado. Arriving at Johnson’s Fort, above
Sacramento, about October 1, 1849, his first month in the state was
spent on the American river, where he followed mining, after which he came to
Sacramento and sold his team and stock. He then went to San Francisco and
thence to the San Antonio redwoods in Contra Costa county,
finally locating in Martinez in the spring of 1850, where he taught the first
school in Contra Costa county in a little house now owned by William Gift.
Before the close of the term the number of pupils increased from six to
twenty-six, principally the children of Spanish parents. He taught two summer terms
there, when, in December, 1850, he went into the mercantile business as a
member of the firm of Hunsaker & Co.,
remaining so occupied until 1854, when he purchased the ranch now owned by
Mr. Cluff. This property he proceeded to improve
and cultivate, making his home in that location until 1876, when he sold out
and took up a claim in Franklin canyon. This he sold the following year, when
he spent a year in Martinez. In 1877 he purchased his present place of
sixty-four acres, which he has since set out to fruit and vineyard.
In California, August 19, 1855, Mr. Holliday married
Jane Ann Holliday, the widow of his brother, Adolphus M.,
and her death occurred in 1886, at the age of fifty-six years. She was the
mother of six children: Mary Jane, born July 2, 1856, is the
widow of George Gilpatrick; Charles Hiram,
of Pinole, born May 31, 1858, married Emily Christian;
William Beverly, born April 24, 1860, and now located on his
father’s ranch, married Nora L. Dukes, now deceased; Minerva L.,
born March 21, 1862, married William Christian, of Rodeo;
Eliza E., born July 21, 1865, married F. T. Brockman,
a rancher of Contra Costa county; and George E., of San Francisco, born
December 12, 1868, married Annie McAvoy.
A Whig in his political convictions in his young manhood, Mr. Holliday
afterward endorsed the principles of the Republican party
and held a number of local offices. In 1850 he was elected justice of the
peace, the first to hold this office in Martinez, and was also elected
associate justice, member of the court of sessions, deputy county treasurer for
four years, and public administrator. He was a charter member of Alhambra
Grange No. 230.
Transcribed by Marie Hassard 20 April 2016.
Source: History
of the State of California & Biographical Record of Coast Counties, California
by Prof. J. M. Guinn, A. M., Pages
1089-1090. The Chapman Publishing Co.,
Chicago, 1904.
© 2016 Marie Hassard.
Contra Costa County Biographies