Santa Clara County
Biographies
EMILE H. BOURGUIGNON
The personal characteristics which have brought about the success of Emile H. Bourguignon are an inheritance from a sturdy ancestry, for many years natives of Brussels, Belgium, where he was born March 9, 1849. His father, Maximilian, and mother, Deseree Housoy, were both natives of the same locality, and there the father died, his wife surviving him and now making her home in Roux-Miroir. They were the parents of four children, two sons and two daughters, of whom the two sons and one daughter attained maturity.
The eldest of his father's family, Emile H. Bourguignon was educated in the public school in the vicinity of his home, when only a lad in years being apprenticed to learn landscape gardening. At eighteen years of age he enlisted in the Grenadier army of Belgium and served five years and one month, receiving promotion, first to a corporal and afterward to sergeant. On leaving the army Mr. Bourguignon located in Brussels and engaged in business, remaining there until 1876 when he brought his family to the United States. He came direct to California and located in San Francisco, making that city his home for two years while he looked up a suitable location for his business. In 1879 he came to San Jose, Santa Clara county, and engaged in the florist business, starting at the foot of the ladder and building up to his present lucrative custom. He now has sixty thousand square feet under glass, and raises cut flowers, which he markets in San Jose, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Sacramento. During the winter season he makes a specialty of the cucumber. He has a fine place of business, being located on Moore Park street, in the Willows.
By his first marriage, which occurred in Belgium, Mr. Bourguignon has one son, Frank, born in San Francisco, who makes his home with his father. He was married a second time in San Jose, to Miss Oraza Waltham, who was born in Nova Scotia. In his political preferment Mr. Bourguignon is independent, reserving the right to cast his ballot for the man whom he considers best equipped for public office. Fraternally he is quite prominent, being a member of the San Jose Lodge No. 322, B.P.O.E.; Triumph Lodge No. 47, K.P.; San Jose Lodge No. 52, Foresters of America; Red Men of San Jose; Ancient Order of United Workmen; Knights and Ladies of Honor; and the National Union.
Transcribed
1-28-16 Marilyn
R. Pankey.
ญญญญSource:
History of the State of California &
Biographical Record of Coast Counties, California by Prof. J. M. Guinn, A.
M., Pages 957-958. The Chapman Publishing Co., Chicago, 1904.
ฉ 2016 Marilyn R.
Pankey.