Santa Clara County
Biographies
RALEIGH ALEXANDER MORTON
A notable acquisition to the mechanical and inventive life of San Jose is Raleigh Alexander Morton, proprietor of the Morton Motor Works and inventor of the Morton center fire balanced gas engine. Mr. Morton is a natural mechanic, and he has the capacity for infinite painstaking required of people who succeed beyond the ordinary in his line of work. His gas engine is a matter of recent perfection, active work upon it having been begun soon after his arrival here in 1897. At the time he was engaged in ranching near the city, and in the work shop on his place spent his leisure hours in experimenting and building his first engine, completing the same in the fall of 1902, and receiving his patent therefor the following December. In July, 1902, he started his present shop and automobile works, completing his first test automobile in the spring of 1904. With the zeal born of encouragement and success, he started the building of three large and three small motors, at the same time filling orders for pumping and launch engines. His shop on Third street is operated by an engine of his own manufacture, and is fitted with every device for experimenting on new, as well as the creating of models already perfected. He would seem to have unrivaled success ahead of him, for he has both ability and perseverance and is thoroughly absorbed in the tasks he has set himself to do.
Born in Dodge county, Minn., January 31, 1866, Mr. Morton inherits his mechanical ingenuity from his father, A. C. Morton, who was born in New York state, and in early life was a farmer near Lansing, Mich., to which state he removed with his parents when four years old. The elder Morton moved to Dodge county, Minn., when lumbering was in its infancy in that section, and, taking advantage of a waiting opportunity, built a sawmill and operated it with signal success for several years. He then turned his attention to blacksmithing and wagon manufacturing until 1876. In the meantime his wife, formerly Mary Sanford, daughter of Elias Sanford of Illinois, died, leaving him with the care of several small children. Thinking to better his prospects, Mr. Morton brought his family to California in 1876, and after farming for two years in the vicinity of Santa Cruz, located in Fresno county, where he engaged in farming and stock-raising. Still later he located near Fresno, where he still lives, and where he has a large vineyard, owning also a stock ranch in the Sierra Nevada mountains. In California Mr. Morton married his second wife, Elvira (Heacock) Morton, sister of A. A. Heacock, who came to California in 1846, and was the first keeper of the Santa Cruz lighthouse, retaining the position until his death. Ten of the thirteen children in Mr. Morton’s family are living, five sons, and five daughters.
Raleigh Alexander Morton was ten years old when he came with the family to California. He attended the public schools of Santa Cruz, and after removing to Fresno county in 1879 worked on the farm, and later learned the blacksmithing and wagon making trades, following the same in different parts of the state. During 1886-87 he attended Healdsburg College, taking the ministerial course, intending at the time to devote the balance of his life to the church. Owing to failing health he was obliged to seek a less confining occupation, and after completing his junior year returned home to recuperate. For the following three years he engaged in evangelistic work in the Seventh Day Adventist Church in Fresno and vicinity, then returned to his trade as being far better for his health. Gradually he became interested in mechanical inventions and now has two patents allowed and four pending. He makes a specialty of all kinds of launch and boat engines, and manufactures engines from two and a half to one hundred and twenty-five horsepower. Pattern making, repairing of all kinds and metal stamping are also included in his line, and he has a trade which ofttimes tests the capacity of his shop.
Mr. Morton married in Fresno Sadie Nules, a native of Iowa, who is the devoted mother of six children: Hurbert, Clydie, Delphia, Beulah and Eulah, twins; and Raleigh Glenn. Mr. Morton still retains his interest in the Seventh Day Adventist Church, and is the local elder of the church at San Jose. He is an energetic worker for humanity, and in both precept and example lives near to his highest ideals. He is a genial approachable gentleman, kin to his employes, and loyal to his friends and business interest.
Transcribed by Joyce Rugeroni.
Source: History
of the State of California & Biographical Record of Coast Counties,
California by Prof. J. M. Guinn, A. M., Pages 1408-1409. The Chapman
Publishing Co., Chicago, 1904.
© 2017 Joyce Rugeroni.