Santa Clara County
Biographies
MRS. CATHERINE T. RYAN
The genial and popular postmistress of Gilroy is one of the brave, strong women who adversity can not daunt, and who is equal to any emergency which fate, kind or otherwise, sends her way. As a representative of the women who are filling positions of trust and responsibility under the government in the west, none is more sincerely honored, or more worthy of the confidence of an enlightened and exacting community. Receiving the presidential appointment in November, 1903, she took up the thread of duty where her husband left it at the time of his death in 1903, at the early age of thirty-two years, and has not only managed the affairs of Uncle Sam with neatness and dispatch, but has been the means of securing an increased capacity and important improvements in the local mail service.
Mrs. Ryan is proud of her German ancestry, and of the career of her father, Henry Schafer, a California pioneer of 1850, and one of the largest sheep raisers of his time in the coast country. Mr. Schafer came to America a single man in the vigor of his youth and enthusiasm and not long afterward married Mary Ford, a native of Ireland, who bore him one daughter and two sons, of whom Augustus is a practicing physician of Bakersfield, and Daniel is a farmer of Merced county. Mrs. Schafer survives her husband, and lives with her daughter, the postmistress of Gilroy. At first engaging in the wholesale and retail butchering business in San Francisco, Mr. Schafer branched out into ranching in the San Joaquin valley, and in 1872 came to Gilroy, where he established a comfortable home for his family. With this as his headquarters he engaged in a constantly growing sheep industry, owning large tracts of land in Merced and Santa Clara counties. For many years he managed the sheep business of Miller & Lux, and while thus employed gained the exhaustive knowledge of sheep raising which justified him in embarking on an independent venture. He was successful beyond the average, and at the time of his death December 25, 1898, left a comfortable fortune to his wife and children.
As Catherine T. Schafer, Mrs. Ryan attended the public schools of Gilroy, and was trained in a Christian home of refinement. Her marriage with Richard M. Ryan occurred in 1898, and was in every way an ideal and happy union. Mr. Ryan was a young man of energy and resource, and before him stretched a future of exceeding promise. He was born in Ireland March 25, 1870, and came to the United States with his parents in 1882, his father, Richard Ryan, settling in Gilroy, where he still lived retired. Young Mr. Ryan grew in popular favor after he finished his education and entered the commercial life of the town, and after his appointment served as assistant postmaster of Gilroy for eight years, being advanced to the position of postmaster under the administration of President McKinley, serving five years. He was a Republican of long standing, and an earnest, ambitious, and high-minded gentleman, making and retaining friends, and increasing his chances of preferment at every step of his career. Mrs. Ryan is a well educated, well informed, and exceedingly amiable woman, tactful in her dealings with the public, and delightful in the circle bounded by her many friends. She is a consistent member of the Catholic Church, and a promoter of the clubs and enterprises which raise the social life of Gilroy to its high standard. Mrs. Ryan is the mother of a daughter, Mary Helen Ryan.
Transcribed
11-3-15 Marilyn
R. Pankey.
ญญญญSource:
History of the State of California &
Biographical Record of Coast Counties, California by Prof. J. M. Guinn, A.
M., Page 855. The Chapman Publishing Co., Chicago, 1904.
ฉ 2015 Marilyn R.
Pankey.