Santa
Clara County
Biographies
ALVIN L. ELLIS
A native and to the manner born, Alvin L. Ellis is a
worthy representative of the thriving and respected business men of Santa Clara
county. Pleasantly located about three miles east of Gilroy, he is closely
identified with the agricultural and dairying interests of this vicinity, in
the management of his large ranch showing marked ability and excellent
judgment. A son of the late James H. and Harriet Ellis, he was born near Santa
Clara, September 3, 1855. His paternal and ancestral history to some extent may
be found on another page of this volume, in connection with the sketch of his
father, James H. Ellis.
His parents removing to Gilroy, or
near here, in 1857, Alvin L. Ellis obtained his rudimentary education in the
Gilroy public schools, after which he attended the University of the Pacific
for three years, and then took a course at the San Jose Business College.
Establishing himself in business in Gilroy as a hardware merchant, he built up
a most extensive and prosperous trade in his special line of goods, which
included shelf and heavy hardware, and agricultural implements. At the end of
twenty years, Mr. Ellis disposed of his stock of goods, but still owns the
large building located at Nos. 34 and 36 Monterey street,
his property occupying about half a block in the heart of the city. While he
was thus employed, Mr. Ellis was also interested in farming and dairying, to
which he is now devoting his entire attention. His farm, containing eighty-five
acres of bottom land, is located three and one-half miles from Gilroy, and is
one of the finest in the county. He also leases three hundred and fifteen acres
of his mother’s estate, which is devoted to farming and dairying, in all about
four hundred acres. He keeps about one hundred cows, Holsteins and Durhams, and has a large factory, in which he manufactures
the celebrated A. L. Ellis California cheese, which has a ready sale in all the
markets of the Pacific coast, bringing the highest quoted prices. The most
famous cow in his herd supplies his family of nine with all the milk and butter
used on the table or in cooking, and twenty pounds of butter per week besides
for the market, her record as a milk producer being seldom, if ever, exceeded.
On his land, which is especially rich, he raises
without irrigation fine crops of alfalfa and garden vegetables, his radishes
being as large as ordinary beets, while his cow beets, of which he has fifteen
acres, yield sixty tons to an acre.
In San Jose, Mr. Ellis married Miss
Catharine Augusta Herbold, who was born in Mason Valley, Nev., a daughter of
Adam and Alberta Herbold, pioneer settlers of Nevada, now residing in National
City, San Diego county. Mrs. Ellis was educated at the University of the
Pacific in San Jose. Of the children born of the marriage of Mr. and Mrs.
Ellis, six are living, namely: Harriet; Lillian; Mrs. Ruby Whiteley,
of Oakland; Vesta; Laura; and Ruth. Politically Mr.
Ellis is a Republican in national affairs, and fraternally he belongs to Gilroy
Lodge No. 154, I. O. O. F.
Transcribed By: Cecelia M. Setty.
Source: History of the State of California & Biographical Record of Coast
Counties, California by Prof. J. M. Guinn, A. M., Page 934. The Chapman
Publishing Co., Chicago, 1904.
© 2016 Cecelia M. Setty.