LEWIS RISDON MEAD. Among the many able,
brilliant and resourceful men who gained positions of distinction in connection
with civic and business affairs in the cities of the San Francisco Bay district
was the late Lewis Risdon MEAD. The record of his career is the record of
worthy, upright living, of strict adherence to high personal standards, of
talents and powers well used for worthy ends. These things need not be
repeated to the readers of a history of this section of California, for the
life and achievement of Mr. MEAD are a matter of general knowledge here.
Mr. MEAD was one of the most progressive and successful business men of Contra
Costa County, and his name has been known and honored here for many years.
Lewis Risdon MEAD was born at Saline, Michigan,
September 7, 1847, a date that in itself indicates that his parents were
pioneers of the Wolverine State, which had been admitted to the Union ten years
prior to his birth. Mr. MEAD was the elder of the two children of Silas
and Harriet (RISDON) MEAD, the other son, William, being still a resident of
the old family homestead farm near Saline, Michigan. As young men Lewis
R. and William MEAD to New Orleans, Louisiana, and in 1863 the subject of this
memoir came to California, by way of the Isthmus of Panama, he having come to
join his maternal uncle, John RISDON, the founder of the iron works operated by
the firm of RISDON & COFFEY. The plant and business eventually passed
into the possession of Mr. RISDON, and the enterprise was continued under the
title of the RISDON Iron Works until 1914, when the property was sold to
others. With this important industrial concern Mr. MEAD continued his
association many years, and he served as its secretary and auditor until 1907,
when he severed his connection with the business and established his residence
at Byron Hot Springs, situated at the northern end of the San Joaquin Valley,
in Contra Costa County. In the year 1865 Orange RISDON and Lewis R. MEAD
took up 200 acres of government land in that locality, now known as Bryon Hot
Springs, the patents to the tract having been received by them the same
year. The springs on this historic spot have been famous since aboriginal
days. The Indians came here; the wild animals knew it---and well did they
use the healing waters of the bubbling springs. Mr. MEAD
finally purchased Mr. RISDON's interest in their property and assumed the
active management of the springs property, of which he continued the executive
head until the time of his death. The first building at the springs was
erected in 1865, it having been necessary to fill in to a depth of from ten to
twelve feet to make a garden and make provision for the desired shrubbery,
owing to the fact that the land on which the hotel and cottages are situated
was at that time a part of a vast lava bed. The first large hotel at
those famed springs was erected at a cost of $50,000 and this was destroyed by
fire in 1901. In the following year was erected a fine new building of
Moorish type of architecture, the same having been built by Reid Brothers of
San Francisco, at a cost of $350,000. This splendid structure was
destroyed by fire in the year 1912. In 1914 he awarded to Reid
Brothers the contract for the erection of a fire-proof hotel building to cost
$100,000, and this now constitutes the central stage of one of the most popular
health and pleasure resorts in this section of California.
Lewis R. MEAD was a broad-minded man, liberal in
thought and honorable in purpose. His life was fruitful of good results,
not only in the attainment of success, but also in his support of progressive
public measures of enduring benefit to the community. He served as a
regent of the University of California. He was the founder of Brooklyn
Lodge, No. 225, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, at Oakland, of Golden State
Commandery, Knights Templar, and was a member of Islam Temple of the Mystic
Shrine. He was for many years president of the Mechanics Institute of San
Francisco.
The year 1873 recorded the marriage of Mr. MEAD
and Miss Blanche DURANT, and she passed to the life eternal in the year 1905,
the one surviving child having been DR. LOUIS D MEAD, deceased, of whom
specific mention is made in the following sketch. The second marriage of
Mr. MEAD was solemnized June 19, 1907, when Miss Mae SADLER became his
wife. Mrs. MEAD was born in California and is the daughter of Charles M.
SADLER, who is a representative business man of San Francisco, a member of the firm
of SADLER & Company. Miss Mae SADLER was in Europe, as a student at
the time of the great earthquake and fire that brought devastation to her home
city, and her marriage occurred about one year after her return to San
Francisco. Mrs. MEAD was the able and valued coadjutor of her husband in
the planning of the present fine hotel building at Bryan Hot Springs, and the
same stands as an enduring and worldly monument to the memory of Mr.
MEAD. The hotel has for fire protection, water pumped from the river,
nearly two miles distant, and a destruction of the present building by fire is
virtually in realm of the impossible. Mrs. MEAD and Mrs. James. W.
REID are the owners of all the stock in the company controlling the Bryon Hot
Springs and hotel, and the hotel is leased to Mr. TAIT, a prominent and popular
hotel and restaurant of California. Mr. MEAD was a stalwart advocate of
the principles of the republican party, and in public affairs his influence was
always helpful and benignant. Strong in his conviction and well fortified
in his opinions, he was a loyal to himself and thus to all others, and his
character was the positive expression of a strong and noble nature. His
religious faith was that of the Protestant Episcopal Church of which his widow
is an earnest communicant. The death of Mr. MEAD occurred June 13, 1916.
Transcribed
by: Deana Schultz.
Source: "The San
Francisco Bay Region" Vol. 3 page 48-50 by Bailey Millard. Published by The
American Historical Society, Inc. 1924.
© 2004 Deana Schultz