Sacramento County
Biographies
CHARLES E.
BUNNELL
CHARLES
E. BUNNELL—A popular,
because efficient and fearless public official, is Charles E. Bunnell the level-headed justice of the peace of Courtland,
who is also a successful broker and man of affairs in the commercial world, and
has been able to exert an enviable influence in favor of broad and permanent
development in this part of the favored county of Sacramento. He was born in
the capital city on February 12, 1870, the son of Charles E. and Elizabeth D.
(Woodman) Bunnell, well known to our readers, as
worthy and sturdy pioneers. The father was born in the state of Connecticut, July 8, 1831, and came to California in 1854, moving to Stockton in 1867. He died in a hospital in San Francisco in 1902, leaving his widow, who is still
living and resides in Courtland with our subject, who is unmarried. The mother
was born January 28, 1847, at Fort Madison, Iowa. Her father, “Squire” James Woodman,
crossed the plains in 1849, and seven years later brought his family out to California. They had six children: Nellie is now
Mrs. Nellie Callaway, whose sketch appears in this volume. Charles E. is the
subject of this review. Edward E. is a rancher on Merritt Island in Yolo County. Frederick W. died at forty-one years of
age, unmarried. Bessie C. is single and resides at Courtland with her brother,
Charles. Minnie E. is now the wife of E. G. Kirtlan,
a broker who resides in Courtland.
Having disposed of the grammar school work
in the Richland district school, and taken
a commercial course in the business college at Auburn, Charles E. Bunnell
started out for himself at the age of twenty-two, when he took up farming. He
leased from time to time from 100 to 200 acres of land in the delta of the Sacramento River, and there he raised fruit, beans and
grain. Four years ago, he bought a ten-acre orchard, and he has operated this,
while always making his home at Cortland. In 1906, he built his residence in
Courtland; and when this was burned to the ground, he immediately rebuilt it.
He is a broker of wide experience and absolute dependability, and he deals in
beans, grain and asparagus.
A favorite among citizens who care for law
and order and the good repute of the community in which they and their families
dwell, Charles Bunnell was elected justice of the
peace of Franklin Township, and served for eight years; and when Franklin and
Georgiana Townships were consolidated into the present Georgiana Township, he
consented to stand again as a candidate, and was reelected justice of the new
and enlarged township. He has served, with satisfaction to everybody. He is a
trustee of the Franklin Masonic Hall Association. This association has just
completed building the new Masonic Temple. In national politics a Republican,
Judge Bunnell is never a partisan when it comes to
the consideration of supporting what seems to be best, in men or measures for
the locality in which he lives. He is a past master of Franklin Masonic Lodge
No. 143 or Courtland, and a member of the Onisbo
Chapter, No. 164, of the Eastern Star of the same place.
Transcribed
by Gloria Wiegner Lane.
Source: Reed, G.
Walter, History of Sacramento County,
California With Biographical Sketches, Page
509. Historic Record Company, Los Angeles, CA. 1923.
© 2007 Gloria Wiegner
Lane.