Sacramento County
Biographies
FRANCISCO F. SILVA
FRANCISCO F. SILVA.--The latter part of
the active life of Francisco F. Silva has been associated with fruit raising on
his home place of seven and a half acres on the Fruitridge
Road, and his success in this industry is as marked as was his success for
fifteen years in the feed and fuel business in Sacramento. He was born in Fayal,
Azores Islands,
April 8, 1864, a son of John F. and Mary (Pachcota)
Silva, the former a native of the Isle of Pico and the latter of Fayal. John
F. Silva came to California first in 1846 and prospected
in Sonoma County;
then he returned to his native country and his second journey to California
occurred in the late fifties; he again returned to Fayal, where he was married and where he
passed away, survived b five children and his widow. In May, 1878, Francisco F. and his brother
Charles arrived in California and located at Sutterville,
where Francisco F. Silva worked on a dairy farm for fifty cents per day; the
following Spring he went to Davisville, where he
received two dollars per day, working in the harvest fields; later, with his
brother John, he went into the dairy business at Fremont, which was
successfully conducted until 1893, when Francisco F. Silva sold his interest
and moved to Fallon, Nev., where he engaged in farming and stock raising for
eight years on a 500-acre ranch. In
1901, Mr. Silva made a trip to Fayal
to close his parent’s estate. This
occupied him for eight months, and upon returning to California
he located at Sacramento, where he
established a feed and fuel yard at 15 Front Street,
which he conducted for fifteen years, when he sold out and retired to his fruit
ranch on the Fruitridge Road. About four years ago he purchased range land
in the vicinity of Toll, Cal.,
from which the timber is being removed and the land planted to orchard.
On
September 22, 1908, Mr. Silva was married to Miss Bessie Mugford,
a pioneer of Sutter Creek, Cal. The late John Mugford,
father of Mrs. Silva, was a pioneer rancher in Amador
County. Mr. and Mrs. Silva are the parents of six
children: Bessie L., Hazel, Sarah, Helen, Ada, and Frank F., Jr.
Transcribed
by Priscilla Delventhal.
Source: Reed, G. Walter, History
of Sacramento County, California With Biographical Sketches, Pages 727-728. Historic Record Company, Los Angeles, CA.
1923.
© 2007 P. J. Delventhal.