Santa
Clara County
Biographies
EDMUND L. FELLOWS
One of the most extensive promoters of
fruit culture in Santa Clara county, is Edmund L. Fellows, owner of a sixty-two
acre tract on McCoy avenue, Santa Clara, who leases six hundred and fifty acres
of fruit land, better known as the J.B. Randol ranch, one of the largest and best
deciduous in the state of
California. Mr. Fellows’ reputation as
one of the foremost in his line has been gained in a comparatively short time,
his horticultural experience dating from 1890 when he leased four hundred acres
of land and proceeded to place it under the choicest fruits grown in the
state. As his effort met with
appreciation in the home markets he found his land inadequate for all needs,
hence the large tract which he now controls, and which is advantageously devoted
to prunes and peaches, three hundred acres of the former, and two hundred and
fifty for the latter. His home ranch
consists of sixty-two acres, is under a high state of cultivation, and is one
of the truly pleasant and hospitable rural places in the neighborhood. Mr. Fellow has made a practical study of
prunes and peaches, and few in the county are more familiar with the different
kinds, and with the difficulties which beset the extensive grower. He is an ardent lover of nature, is devoted
to his interesting and expanding calling, and being gifted with business
sagacity, has long since passed from the experimental to the assuredly
successful stage.
Himself a native son of California, and
born in Napa Cal., April 4, 1865, Mr. Fellows comes from a pioneer family of
1850, established in the state by his father, George Fellows. Leaving his native state of
New Hampshire with his parents when nine years of age, the elder Fellows was
reared near Galena, Ill., and in 1850 took advantage of the emigration of gold
seekers to the coast. More
fortunate than many, he acquired a genuine liking for mining and was interested
for the balance of his life, operating on a scale of gradually increasing
proportions. From the Hangtown region he
removed to Snow Point, Nevada county and there discovered the Plumbago mines,
and later the Fellow Lead, laterally called Gold
Canon. Still later he located other
large and paying properties and became known as one of the most successful gold
mine owners and operators in the vicinity.
In 1862 he removed to Napa City, and from 1870 until 1875 was
superintendent of the Phoenix quick-silver mines near Calistoga. He next engaged in general farming near
Brentwood Contra Costa county, and in 1880 removed to
a farm at Spangle, near Spokane, Wash.
His return to Mountainview, Cal., in the early
spring of 1900 proved disastrous, for a change of climate and the approach of
old age combined to shorten his earthly pilgrimage, and his death occurred May
16, 1900. He married Ann McCabe, who was
born in Springfield, Ill., and who crossed the plains with her parents in 1852,
her father, Thomas McCabe, settling on the farm near Brentwood, where he died
in 1886.
The fifth of six sons and five daughters,
Edmund Fellows was educated in the common schools of California. In the vicinity of San Jose he engaged in
farming until 1890, in which year he became convinced of the adaptability of
the county to fruit culture, and began to seriously put his theories into execution. He married into one of the pioneer families
of this region, Laura E. McCoy being a daughter of Ruben McCoy born in Greene county, Tenn., February 4, 1825. Mr. McCoy removed to Jackson county, Mo., with his father in 1836, and several months
later went to work for a paternal uncle in Platte country, the same state. April 13, 1850, he started for California
with ox teams, and August 29 reached the mines where average success awaited
his efforts. Fourteen months later he
returned to the occupation of farming in which he had been trained, and which
had been followed by his ancestors for many generations, settling on the farm
new occupied by Mr. Fellows. He married,
December 12, 1866, Ellen D. England, who was born in Missouri, and who is a
member of the Fellows household, surviving her husband, who died August 9,
1886.
In addition to his large agricultural and
horticultural responsibilities, Mr. Fellow is prominently identified with the
political and social affairs in the country, being a stanch Republican, who
has, nevertheless, remained unalterably outside the ranks of office seekers. He is a member of Lodge No. 238, O.O.O.F., of
Santa Clara, and of the Rebekahs of the same town. He is also identified with the Orchardists of
Santa Clara county.
Transcribed by
Louise E. Shoemaker, December 10, 2015.
Source: History
of the State of California & Biographical Record of Coast Counties,
California by Prof. J. M. Guinn, A. M., Pages 916-919. The Chapman
Publishing Co., Chicago, 1904.
© 2015 Louise E. Shoemaker.