Los Angeles County
Biographies
HENRY
GUENTHER WEYSE
As one of the learned, able and successful members of the legal profession in Los Angeles, Henry Guenther Weyse has long commanded the uniform respect of his fellowmen. A degree of interest is added to his record by the statement that he is of the twelfth successive generation of his family who have followed the law as a profession. The family is an old one, of Saxon origin, being traced back in unbroken line to 1530. Mr. Weyse’s grandfather, George Guenther Weyse, a native of the city of Schleiz, Reuss, Germany, was an eminent jurist, acted as privy councilor to the reigning count and also represented his principality in all the negotiations during and occasioned by the Napoleonic wars. His son, Julius Guenther Weyse, who became the founder of the family in America, was born at Schleiz, Reuss, Germany, where he was reared to manhood and received his early education. Through fifteen years’ attendance at colleges and universities of his native land he acquired a well rounded education and entered upon his career with a well equipped mind, trained in logic and analysis, together with which he had a natural endowment of a fertile imagination and poetic ability of a high order, which won for him the praise of his teachers. Having taken an active part in the unsuccessful movement to reestablish the German empire, he found it essential to his personal safety to absent himself from his native land, at least temporarily, and in about 1836 he came to the United States. After stopping briefly in many of the principal cities of the east, he settled down at Jefferson City, Missouri, where he engaged in educational work until 1846, when he decided to return to the fatherland, towards which his thoughts and longings had increasingly drawn him. During his stay in this country, and while in Cincinnati, Ohio, he was made a member of the Masonic order. He reached his native city in 1846, and remained there until 1848, when his patriotic interest in the welfare of his country led him to participate in the historic revolution. Again he found himself allied with a losing cause and in October, 1850, with others, he left home, embarking on the barque McDowd, on which he made the long voyage around Cape Horn to San Francisco, at which port he arrived in March, 1851. Going to Tuolumne county, he engaged in mining for a time but later turned his attention to the newspaper business in San Francisco. Early in 1857 he came to Southern California, establishing his permanent residence in Los Angeles. Soon after coming here he bought twenty acres of land at which is now the corner of San Pedro and Eighth streets, on which was planted a vineyard, and here he made his home until his death in 1863. He was greatly interested in the development of the grape industry in Southern California, to which he devoted much of his time and attention, and was a prominent factor in the founding and building up of Anaheim. He became one of the organizers of the Los Angeles Vineyard Company, and in various ways he showed a marked capacity for business and an effectiveness in accomplishing things for the benefit of his section of the state. Wherever he lived during his entire life he showed a community interest, an instance of which was his joining the state militia of Missouri, in which he was commissioned a captain. He was married to Miss Caroline A. Lange, who was a native of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, and came to San Francisco in 1855. She survived her husband a number of years, her death occurring at the Los Angeles homestead in 1887. They became parents of three sons, namely: Otto Guenther, a merchant, who died in San Francisco in 1893; Rudolph Guenther, who was born in Los Angeles in 1860 and for many years has been engaged in business in this city; and Henry Guenther, of this review. On October 25, 1890, Rudolph Guenther Weyse married Miss Ada Frances Barrows, a daughter of H. D. and Mary Alice (Workman) Barrows.
An interesting notation on the Weyse family history is here quoted from “Die Weyse,” a genealogical work compiled by Archivant Dr. Schmidt, and printed in Schleiz, Germany, in March, 1913, as follows: “We now consider the vocation of the members of the Weyse family. They are characterized by the fact of the social and cultural heights on which the family has stood since the second half of the sixteenth century: that its male members from the ancestor, Zacharias, down to the present time have almost all had university educations, as, for instance, the ancestors of the now living Henry Guenther Weyse of the branch at Los Angeles, back to the said ancestor have without exception been jurists, making twelve generations of lawyers without a break.”
Henry Guenther Weyse was born on the family homestead in Los Angeles on the 27th of July, 1863, and early in life was sent with his brothers to Gera, Germany, to be educated. On his return to this country he entered the law school of Harvard University, from which he was graduated with the degree of Bachelor of Laws in 1888. He was admitted to the bar of California and at once entered upon the practice of his profession in Los Angeles, in which city he has continued throughout the intervening period of forty-five years.
Mr. Weyse has been married twice, first on October 2, 1888, to Miss Alice Wolfskill Barrows, a daughter of H. D. And Juanita (Wolfskill) Barrows, the latter being the daughter of the well known old pioneer, William Wolfskill, who settled in Los Angeles in 1831 and was one of the very first Americans to locate here. Mrs. Alice Weyse passed away November 6, 1903, leaving a daughter Mary Alice, now the widow of Thomas S. Woodruff and residing in Pasadena. On the 19th of October, 1908, Mr. Weyse was married to Miss Ysabel Wolfskill, a daughter of Louis Wolfskill, who was the youngest son of William Wolfskill. To this union have been born three children: Ysabel, wife of Harry Tribolet, San Blas, Mexico; Heinrich Guenther and Dettmar Guenther, both attending Pomona College.
Mr. Weyse is a republican and in former years he took an active part in public affairs. In 1894 he was elected to represent his district in the lower house of the state legislature, serving during the session of 1895. He is a member of the Los Angeles County Bar Association and the California State Bar Association. He has shown a public- spirited interest in those things which have concerned the welfare and progress of Los Angeles and has been an exemplar of the highest ideals as a lawyer and citizen. Kindly and courteous in manner, he has a host of warm friends throughout the community and commands the sincere respect of all who know him.
Transcribed
2-23-12 Marilyn R. Pankey.
Source: California
of the South Vol. II, by John Steven McGroarty, Pages
139-142, Clarke Publ., Chicago, Los Angeles, Indianapolis. 1933.
© 2012 Marilyn R. Pankey.
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