San
Joaquin County
Biographies
DOMINGO CHANGALA
Among the interesting citizens of
Stockton and San Joaquin County who have done their best to make this a better
place in which to carry on business and to live, is Domingo Changala, now counted
among the leading sheepmen of central California. A native of France, he was born in the
Basses-Pyrenees, southern France, September 29, 1878. He was reared on his father’s farm and
attended the public schools of his neighborhood, working on the farm during
vacations. Upon reaching military age,
he entered the French army as an infantryman and served for two years in
France, and one year in the French possessions in Africa. When leaving the army, Mr. Changala
determined to come to America and California, and borrowing the money for his
passage from his cousin he set out alone.
He had an acquaintance in Stockton and upon his arrival here on December
26, 1902, found himself without money and a stranger in a strange land, unused
to the customs and language, but he soon found employment on the John Prather
ranch, near Linden, as a herder of sheep for which he received twenty-five
dollars per month. He worked for Mr.
Prather for five and one-half years and never missed a single day, a record he
may well feel proud of. By the end of
the first year he had repaid his cousin the money he had borrowed; then the
next two years, or during his father’s lifetime, he sent his father nearly all
his earnings because he was poor and needed help.
Through hard work and economy Mr.
Changala accumulated money enough to invest in 1,100 sheep of his own, and from
this small beginning he advanced to be one of the leading sheepmen of the
county, running as high as 5,000 head; at the present writing he has about
4,000. He employs only the most approved
methods in caring for his flocks, which in large measure accounts for his
success. As a member of the Central
California Sheep Growers’ Association he has been active in bringing about a
number of things that have been beneficial both to the grower and to the
consumer. Showing his faith in
California realty, Mr. Changala has invested in a fine dairy and alfalfa ranch
of sixty acres near Patterson, in Stanislaus County, and here he has a fine
herd of fifty Holstein cows; he also owns valuable real estate in Stockton.
The marriage of Mr. Changala on
January 6, 1909, in Stockton, united him with Miss Etinnette
Arrabit, born in the Basses-Pyrenees. She came to California in 1908 and has since
been a resident of Stockton. They have
three interesting children: Josephine
Annie, Nellie Katherine and John Battiste. Mr. Changala here became a citizen of the
United States in Stockton in 1915 and ever since has done by his duty as he saw
it by voting for the best men and measures that in his estimation would be of
the great benefit to the people and to the country. It is to such self-made men that the county
can look with pride for they have done what they could to advance every
interest and every reform, to make the county and state take its proper place
in the history of our great nation.
Transcribed by V. Gerald Iaquinta.
Source: Tinkham, George
H., History of San Joaquin County, California , Pages
1436-1439. Los Angeles, Calif.: Historic
Record Co., 1923.
© 2012 V. Gerald Iaquinta.
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