Colusa County
Biographies
CHARLES W. TUTTLE
Not many years after the Pilgrim
Fathers crossed the ocean to the new world the Tuttle family established their
home in Massachusetts, the records showing that they landed in 1635. From that
year to the present they have furnished to our country men of valor for warfare
and men of commercial enterprise for times of peace. One of the ancestors, who
was the son of a Revolutionary hero, long practiced the medical profession in
Hancock, Hillsboro county, N. H., and his son followed mercantile enterprises
until his death in early manhood. Adolphus Darwin
Tuttle, who was a son of this merchant, was born and reared in New Hampshire
and for years owned a store in Hancock, that state, where also he served as
selectman, postmaster and in other local offices of trust. During 1887 he came
to California and settled in San Francisco, where he died.
By his marriage to Lucy M. Bigelow,
a native of Massachusetts, A. D. Tuttle became identified with one of the
historic colonial families of America. Her father, Rev. Asahel
Bigelow, a minister of the Congregational Church, was a native of Massachusetts
and a descendant of English Puritans of colonial lineage, one of the ancestors
having been a member of the Massachusetts troops during the Revolutionary war.
It is worthy of note that for twenty-five years he held a pastorate in Walpole
and for a similar period preached the Gospel in the Hancock Church. At the age
of seventy-eight he retired from the ministry and two years later passed from
earth. His wife, who attained the age of ninety years, bore the maiden name of
Homes and was the great-granddaughter of one of the first settlers of Boston.
Mrs. Lucy M. Tuttle died in San Francisco in 1903, when sixty-nine years of
age. Her only child, Charles W., was born in Hancock, N. H., May 28, 1862, and
received superior educational advantages, being a student in Phillips Academy
at Exeter, N. H., and later in Bowdoin College, from which he was graduated in
1886 with the degree of A. B. Three years later the degree of A. M. was
conferred upon him by his alma mater. Desiring to perfect his education he went
to Germany in the fall of 1886 and matriculated in the University of Gottingen,
and later spent a year in the Royal School of Mines at Freiberg, Saxony,
returning to the United States in 1888 and accepting the position of assistant
professor in chemistry at Bowdoin College.
In order to assume the management of
his large landed interests in California Mr. Tuttle removed to the coast in
1889, at first making his home in San Francisco, although since 1897 he has
resided in Colusa. He owns a two-thirds interest in the Jimeno
rancho of more than twenty thousand acres, extending from Colusa along the west
side of the Sacramento river into Yolo county as far
as the north line of the Fair ranch. Originally the entire tract to Knights
Landing was in the same company’s possession. Almost the entire property has
been reclaimed and is under cultivation to wheat and barley. When he began to
improve the place it was open country without a tree in sight, but now there
are many fine ornamental trees and a park of three acres, in the midst of which
lies his beautiful residence, reflecting the cultured
tastes of its inmates. It is gracefully presided over by Mrs. Tuttle, who was
formerly Miss Nellie A. Jordan, and is brightened by the presence of their four
children, Curtis, Charlotte, Darwin and Charles. The father of Mrs. Tuttle was
Capt. John Jordan, of New England, who was an officer in the trans-Atlantic
(sic) and East India trade and died at sea. By travel in this country and
aboard Mr. Tuttle has acquired a breadth of culture and knowledge that makes
him a genial companion, and his social standing among the people of Colusa is the
highest. He is a member of the Colusa Board of Trade and bore an influential
part in organizing the Colusa free library, of which he is now the secretary.
The success of this educational movement is a source of great gratification to
him, as it is to all public-spirited citizens. While he is not identified with
any denomination, he attends the Presbyterian Church and is a contributor to
its maintenance. Fraternally he is connected with the Benevolent Protective
Order of Elks at Marysville, while his social associations include membership
in the University Club, the Pacific Union Club of San Francisco and the Colusa
Shooting Club, of which he is now a director.
Transcribed By: Cecelia M. Setty.
Source: "History of the State of
California and Biographical Record of the Sacramento
Valley, Cal.," J. M. Guinn, Pages
611-612.
The Chapman Publishing Company, Chicago, 1906.
© 2017 Cecelia M. Setty.
Golden Nugget Library's Colusa County Biographies