Los Angeles County
Biographies
EDWIN
KITCHEN ALPAUGH
EDWIN
KITCHEN ALPAUGH.-- Orange Grower and President of the
Provident Pledge Corporation, Los Angeles, California, was born in Asbury, New
Jersey, February 28, 1853, the son of John R. Alpaugh
and Sarah Ann (Ingham) Alpaugh. He married Sarah E. Slack, daughter of
General James R. Slack, at Huntington, Indiana, May 17, 1882 and to them there
was born a daughter, Mary I. Alpaugh. Mr. Alpaugh is
descended from Colonial stock, connected on the maternal side with the Runkle and Ingham families of New Jersey. The Runkles trace
back in direct line to the middle ages, at which time
they were among the nobility of Germany.
The first of this branch in America was Adam Runkle,
the great-great-grandfather of Mr. Alpaugh, and a man
of prominence and great religious fervor during the Revolutionary period. His son, William, great-grandfather of Mr. Alpaugh, was a wealthy farmer and land owner of New Jersey,
noted as one of the commanding men of his section. His daughter married Jonathan W. Ingham and
they were the parents of Mr. Alpaugh's mother.
Mr. Alpaugh
spent his childhood in New Jersey and from 1860 to 1863 attended an academy at Clinton, N.J., but the family removing to Indiana
in 1863, the greater part of his life was spent in the latter State. His parents located on a farm and he helped
his father during the greater part of each year, going to the country school
for about three months out of the twelve.
Concluding his schooling when he was about sixteen years of age Mr. Alpaugh worked on the farm of his father until 1871, when
he moved to Wabash, Indiana, and went into the drug business.
For the next two years Mr. Alpaugh confined his time to the drug business in Wabash
and in Lagro, Indiana, and in 1873 moved to
Huntington, Indiana, where he obtained employment as a clerk in a drug
store. The confining life of stores told
on his health in time, and in 1876 he gave up the drug business, in which he
had become known as a capable pharmacist, and went to Tennessee, where he
worked in the woods for three years.
Returning to Huntington, Indiana, in
1879, Mr. Alpaugh embarked in the drug business for
himself and conducted a store there for about five years, but sold it out at
the end of that time and went into the lumber business with his
brother-in-law. They operated under the
name of Slack & Alpaugh, and for more than ten
years, Mr. Alpaugh was active in the business, but
sold out his interest in 1895 and practically retired from active business for
several years.
Accompanied by his wife, Mr. Alpaugh traveled through the northwestern part of the
United States for some time, going as far north as Alaska and then returned to
Indiana by way of the Pacific Coast.
They halted in Los Angeles for a time and Mr. Alpaugh
was so impressed with Southern California during his brief stay there that he
sold his home in Indiana in 1898 and returned to Los Angeles, in and near where
he has made his home ever since.
For about two years Mr. Alpaugh was not actively engaged in business, but in the
early part of 1900 he purchased thirty acres of the finest Valencia orange land
from L. J. Rose Sunny Slope estate, one of the celebrated fruit ranches of
Southern California, and has been engaged as an orange grower since that time. He makes his home on the ranch, and in
addition to having been for many years a large shipper of fruit from his own
land, is Vice President of the Citrus Cove Ranch Company.
In 1911, upon the organization of the
Provident Pledge Company of Los Angeles, Mr. Alpaugh,
who had devoted himself exclusively to orange growing, was called from his
ranch to take the office of President of the concern. The Provident Pledge Corporation is
capitalized at $500,000 and was organized for the purpose of lending money at a
minimum rate of interest, with the result that it has served to free Los
Angeles, to a great extent, from the loan shark evil.
Mr. Alpaugh
devotes a large part of his time to business, but also continues as one of the
large individual orange growers of Southern California.
During the time he was engaged in the
drug business, Mr. Alpaugh took an active interest in
scientific matters and was a member of the American Society for the Advancement
of Science, but upon retiring from the business he gave up his membership. He continues his studies of scientific
subjects, but his only affiliation outside of business circles is the Jonathan
Club of Los Angeles, and the Cazadores Gun Club, near
Los Patos.
Transcribed
by Rhonda Ruick O'Brien.
Source: Press
Reference Library, Western Edition Notables of the West, Vol. I, Pages 463-465,
International News Service, New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles,
Boston, Atlanta. 1913.
© 2010 Rhonda
Ruick O'Brien.
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