Sacramento County
Biographies
EZRA W. FOSTER
EZRA W. FOSTER, farmer, Sutter Township, was born December 4, 1828, in Vermont. His father, William T. Foster, was a native of Ireland, a stone-cutter by trade, and came to America at the age of seventeen years. His wife, the mother of Ezra W., was a native of Vermont; her maiden name was Charlotte Chilson. From early boyhood, the subject of our sketch has made his own way in the world. He lived with his grand-parents until the age of seventeen years, when he found that he was not to receive under their care any education. He then resolved to travel out into the world for himself. He began to exhibit a desire for an education at the age of fourteen, and by the time he was seventeen he had received but eighteen months’ schooling. At the tender age mentioned he went to Michigan, where he lived most of the time in Cass and Berrien Counties, working on a farm and clerking in various stores. In April, 1850, having accumulated a little money by hard labor and rigid economy, he started for California overland, came by way of Council Bluffs, Salt Lake City and arrived in Weavertown, this State, July 17, with fifty-five people in the train, after a five months’ journey. Only one of the party was lost on the way by sickness. For the first year followed mining; then he started a small grocery with his uncle, which arrangement continued but a short time. Out of $5,000 invested they obtained but $50 in return, and that was in a mining claim. The next year he was employed in a sale and feed stable in Sacramento. Selling it, in February, 1852, he located a quarter-section of land in Franklin Township. The following spring he sold this and purchased his present property of 365 acres, six miles from Sacramento, between the upper and lower Stockton roads; and then began teaming and speculating in horses and cattle. In 1855 he put in the first crop on the ranch, and from that time he has improved the place until he has made it a fine residence. Hay, grain and live-stock are within the domain of his energies. He still “has a fancy for a good horse;” and of this class of animals he has a number. He also has a ranch of 137 acres six miles south of Sacramento. Mr. Foster has seen his share of the “ups and downs” of California life. August 6, 1856, he married Miss Letitia, daughter of J. Goslin, and a native of England. She died January 2, 1862. By this marriage there were two sons: Adrian, who died at the age of three years and six months; and Harry W., born December 10, 1861.
Transcribed by: Jeanne Sturgis Taylor.
Davis, Hon. Win. J., An Illustrated History of
Sacramento County, California. Page 673. Lewis
Publishing Company. 1890.
© 2007 Jeanne Sturgis Taylor.