San
Joaquin County
Biographies
CHARLES J. BENDER
An enterprising, progressive and
highly successful farmer, whose specialty is that of vineyarding,
is Charles J. Bender, a native of South Russia, and now one of the highly
esteemed residents of San Joaquin County, where he cultivates a trim estate
three and one-half miles to the northwest of Acampo. He was born near Odessa on March 17, 1869,
the son of John Bender, who married Miss Christina Bender, a lady of the same
name but of no blood relationship. His
father was a farmer, and there were nine children in the family, those now
living being: Charles J., Margaret, John
and Bertha. The father had fled his
native land to get away from military oppression, and he came to America with
his family when the oldest child, our subject, was a small boy of four years.
Arriving safely in Yankton County,
Dakota, in 1873, John Bender bought 173 acres of land three miles out of
Yankton; but the time of the great flood on the Missouri River in 1881 swept
all of his property away, stripping him of everything. He then moved to Hudson County, South Dakota,
and there homesteaded 160 acres, as well as locating a timber claim of like
amount. He was successful at farming and
purchased land adjoining, and when he left that state for California in 1903,
he owned 800 acres of fine land.
Arriving at Lodi, he purchased twenty acres and there he resided until
his wife died in 1908, after which he resided in Lodi until his death, July 6,
1916.
The oldest of their nine children,
four of whom are living, Charles J. Bender, remained at home, faithful to his
parents, until he married, in the meantime having profited by such educational
advantages as he could obtain at the public schools in Yankton and in Hudson County. He was married at Menno, in Judson County, on
December 23, 1891, to Miss Elizabeth Ulmer, who was also born in South Russia,
not far from the birthplace of her husband.
She is a daughter of Jacob and Caroline (Mutchelknous)
Ulmer, who came from their birthplace near Odessa, Russia, in 1873 with their
family and located on a homestead near Menno, South Dakota, where the father
became a large landowner and successful stockman. He passed away in 1917, his wife having
preceded him in 1893. Mrs. Bender was
born in 1871, and when one and one-half years old was brought by her parents to
the United States, and out to South Dakota, where they settled near Menno. There she was reared and educated, as one of
a family of seven, each of whom received the best advantages their devoted and
industrious parents could afford.
After their marriage, Mr. and Mrs.
Bender operated a half-section grain farm for five years, and then Mr. Bender
went in to Menno, where he engaged in the dray and livery business. Selling out, he came further west to
California in 1903, where he bought 400 acres of land about three miles to the
northwest of Acampo. Today, he uses 300
acres of this land, forty acres being devoted to a vineyard, in which he has
twelve acres set out to Tokay grapes, and the balance equally to Mission and Zinfandel
grapes. He has twelve acres in alfalfa,
and the rest is open farming land. His
ranch is so piped that he can well irrigate both the vineyard and the alfalfa
pastures. Mr. Bender has deeded fifty
acres to each of his elder sons, and each is running his own ranch. This valuable ranch of 400 acres was formerly
an altogether different prospect; for 160 acres were in a field ranch, while
240 acres were known as the Ing Bros. ranch, all of
which was purchased by Mr. Bender. In
1908 he became one of the original stockholders in the Lodi Cooperative Winery,
that built the winery at Lodi, and he continued interested in it until it was
sold to West & Son. In 1922, he
became a stockholder in a company of ranchers that bought it again.
Six children have blessed the union
of Mr. and Mrs. Bender. Theodore is the
popular and proficient dentist at Lodi; then comes
Eugene; Alma has become Mrs. Koenig; while Calvin, Edna and Ella are at
home. Mr. Bender is a Republican, but
first, last and all the time an American, broadminded enough, especially in
matters of local import, to cast partisanship to the winds when it is necessary
to support some other candidate or measure conceded to be the best. He is a member and trustee of the German
Reformed Church in Lodi, and a member of the order of Sons of Herman.
Transcribed by Gerald Iaquinta.
Source: Tinkham, George
H., History of San Joaquin County, California , Pages
900-903. Los Angeles, Calif.: Historic
Record Co., 1923.
© 2011 Gerald Iaquinta.
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