San
Joaquin County
Biographies
ROBERT BOYCE
An honored pioneer citizen of San
Joaquin County, who contributed generously to the county’s development during a
residence of fifty-five years, Robert Boyce was born in a rural district of Richland
County, Ohio, on July 6, 1847, the son of Jonathan and Nancy (Jump) Boyce,
natives respectively of England and West Virginia. When a young man Jonathan Boyce came out to
America and westward to Ohio, with his parents, where they settled in Richland
County, and he followed agricultural pursuits.
In the year 1859 he crossed the Great Plains with his family, making the
long and tedious journey to California in an ox-team train, and on his arrival
in San Joaquin County, he located at Woodbridge. A true type of the wide-awake and progressive
California pioneer, he saw the value of the virginal land spreading out before
him, and set to work to clear and improve some of it; and because he understood
the possibilities of the soil, and was, all in all, a good farmer, he succeeded
in raising fine crops, and prospered, and steadily adding to these holdings, a
circumstance of double import, for others witnessed his success and were
stimulated to follow his example. Mr.
Boyce and his devoted wife passed away at the old farm homestead, esteemed and
honored by all who knew them.
Robert Boyce, the fourth of their
six children, spent his early boyhood on the Boyce farm in Ohio, but in 1859,
when he was twelve years old, he accompanied his parents across the continent
to Woodbridge, in San Joaquin County.
There he attended the public schools and completed his schooling. He remained on his father’s ranch until he
was twenty-four, and then in 1871, he purchased the adjoining 160 acres. He farmed this tract to grain, and through
the best of care and most scientific cultivation, he coaxed from the soil the
highest yield. In 1882, he purchased
another tract of 160 acres opposite his home-place; and after farming to grain
for many years, he concluded to try viticulture. He therefore experimented, in 1890, by
planting thirty-three acres to a vineyard, and the effort proved so successful
in every way that in 1900 he set out sixty acres more. He was an early shipper of grapes, and built
a house on his ranch especially for packing his products; and continuing to
give unwearied attention to the problems of cultivation, he brought the
properties into full bearing. In 1910 he
removed to Lodi, where he erected a comfortable home from which he
superintended his ranch; but he was not destined long to enjoy these domestic
comforts, passing away on March 17, 1914.
For many years a member of the Knights of Pythias, he was affiliated
with the Woodbridge lodge; and he not only enjoyed an enviable popularity among
his fraternal associates, but he occupied a high place in the esteem of the
community, in which he had lived and labored for so many years, and in whose
welfare he had always felt the keenest interest.
On March 3, 1872, Robert Boyce was
married near Lodi to Miss Lorah K. Turner, a native of Plaquemine, near Baton
Rouge, Louisiana, and the daughter of Frank and Victorine
(Robicheaud) Turner, the former a native of Missouri,
descended from an old and long-honored South Carolina family, and the latter a
native of Louisiana, gracefully representing an old family there of most
interesting French descent. Mr. Turner
crossed the Great Plains to California in 1852, and for four years mined in
Placerville, when he returned east for his wife and two children, whom he
brought out to the coast in 1856, by way of the Isthmus of Panama. At Woodbridge he located on 160 acres, which
he in many ways improved. Mrs. Turner
passed away in California, but her devoted husband spent his last days in
Louisiana. He was for many years a trustee
of the Turner School District, and was decidedly a strong, friendly advocate of
popular education; and was also a member of the Masonic Lodge, in highest
standing. Mr. and Mrs. Boyce were
blessed with two children: Lorah, the
wife of Charles McConnell, passed away in 1911, leaving three children; Martha
D., is the wife of Major Walter E. Garrison, and they
have two daughters.
Since her lamented husband’s death,
Mrs. Boyce has continued to make her home at 303 West Elm Street, Lodi, and to
take an active part in community work, being a member of the Lodi Woman’s Club,
and maintaining a very live interest in civic and social affairs. While not a member of any church, she is
nevertheless a true Christian in spirit and in deed, and believes in doing all
the good she can, especially in matters of unostentatious charity. She still retains the large ranch lands left
her by her husband, and in 1919 she had an additional eighty acres of the old
home ranch planted to Tokay grapes. Mrs.
Boyce has been privileged to witness the most wonderful transformations
effected in California during her long residence and she can recount many
interesting stories of early days. She
well remembers, for example, her trip to the Golden Gate from New Orleans, by
way of Aspinwall, and then across the Isthmus to Panama, when they took passage
on the steamer Golden Gate, and landed in San Francisco in January, 1856. San Joaquin County was then unsettled, Texas
cattle roamed wild everywhere, and settlers were few and far between. But each year showed a steady influx, and
thanks to the path-breaking labors of such pioneers and Mr. and Mrs. Boyce, the
forests were felled, the land cleared, and the desert was made to blossom as
the rose.
Transcribed by Gerald Iaquinta.
Source: Tinkham, George
H., History of San Joaquin County, California , Pages
678-681. Los Angeles, Calif.: Historic
Record Co., 1923.
© 2011 Gerald Iaquinta.
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