Santa Clara County
Biographies
WALTER WALSH
In an effort to gain his share of worldly prosperity Walter Walsh has circled halfway around the world, and upon the western slope has found the opportunity for advancement which taxation and entailed estates make impossible in his native County Kilkenny, Ireland. North of Dublin, and not far from the three beautiful lakes which have made Kilkenny famous, he was born on a farm November 1, 1846, his father, Patrick having been born in probably the same house. His grandfather had tilled the same soil for the greater part of his life, and the property had therefore been clung to tenaciously by bearers of the name of Walsh. In a different part of the county Mary (Whalen) Walsh, the mother of Walter, and of six other boys, and two girls, was born, and her death occurred when a comparatively young woman in 1853. Patrick Walsh continued to manage the farm after the death of his helpmate, pursuing the even tenor of his way, and observing the frugality and moderation and cheerfulness which insure long life and comparative peace. He was born in the century before, his death occurring in 1895, at the age of ninety-seven years.
The sixth in his father's family, Walter Walsh saw his brothers and sisters leave home and become established on their own responsibility, and their example fired his own ambition, and caused his youth to be unsettled and unsatisfied. Accordingly, in 1860, when but thirteen years had passed over his head, he joined an elder brother in Boston, Mass., where he was variously employed for a couple of years. He then found work in the country around Boston, and in different parts of Massachusetts until 1869, when he came to California across the plains by rail, the road having been completed across the continent that year. On the way near Green river he was in a wreck which demolished eleven freight cars. He located in San Jose. In October of the following year he married a fellow countrywoman, Annie Cochran, who crossed the water with her parents when eight years old, locating in Massachusetts. With her family she came to California in 1861, and from the farm in the vicinity of San Jose the young couple moved to the Catherine Dunn ranch near Tenant Station, in 1879. Mr. Walsh managed the latter property for about nine years, and during the time lived within his income, and planned for the purchase of a farm of his own. His hopes were realized in 1880, and his present farm of one hundred and twenty-three acres is the result of tireless effort and wise disposition of both time and money. Located five miles east of Gilroy, Mr. Walsh has made the majority of the improvements on his place, and conducts general farming and stock-raising with the aid of modern agricultural implements, various kinds of stock, and well constructed barns and outhouses. He is one of the prominent Democrats of his locality, and for years has been a member of the school board, holding also other offices of a local nature. Five of his children are living, he has a comfortable and pleasant home, his crops are uniformly excellent, and it would seem that he little of which to complain in his adopted country. Of the children Margaret married Edward Miller, and a stepdaughter, Mary Ann Casy (sic), is the wife of William Sweeney; William Patrick, Walter, John Edmond and Michael Joseph Walsh.
Transcribed
5-30-16 Marilyn
R. Pankey.
ญญญญSource:
History of the State of California &
Biographical Record of Coast Counties, California by Prof. J. M. Guinn, A.
M., Pages 1192. The Chapman Publishing Co., Chicago, 1904.
ฉ 2016 Marilyn R.
Pankey.