San
Joaquin County
Biographies
JAMES A. CONDY
Through
the artistic excellence of his work as an interior and exterior decorator James
A. Condy has built up an excellent business in this line, confining himself to
the highest grade of work. His
grandfather, James Condy, a native of Cornwall, England, came to California via
Panama in 1867, and locating in Stockton with his brother, he ran a sash and
door mill at the corner of California and Channel streets, the present site of
the Stockton Business College block, which Mr. Condy could have purchased at
that time for $600. He followed building
operations in Stockton for a number of years.
In 1869 he was joined by his wife and four children, who made the
journey by way of the Isthmus of Panama, and three children were born to them
in Stockton. James H. Condy, his son,
the father of our subject, was born in Philadelphia and accompanied his mother
to California in 1869. He attended the
Jefferson school and sold the San Francisco Chronicle on the streets of
Stockton; he played the fife in the old fife and drum corps of the Emmett
Guards when he was fourteen years old and followed band work for many years,
playing in the Stockton and Angels Camp Bands.
For some time Mr. Condy worked for
his father in the planing mill in Stockton and then went to Benicia where he
was employed with the Baker & Hamilton Company, contractors and builders,
and helped in the erection of the Benicia high school. He went to Angels Camp just after the town
had been destroyed by fire and helped rebuild it, erecting at least half of the
buildings there. In the twenty years he
was in this district he put up seventy-four buildings and also engaged in
mining. Coming back to Stockton he built
thirty houses in the Oak Park section which he sold on the installment plan,
and he has now retired from active work in this line. On June 19, 1882, he was married to Miss
Lillian Burres, the daughter of Benedict and Harriet Burres; the father crossed the plains in 1858 and for years
farmed on the Waterloo Road, while Mrs. Burres made
the same journey four years later, in 1862.
Mrs. Condy is a member of the Ladies’ Auxiliary of the Pioneer Society,
while Mr. Condy belongs to Angels Camp Lodge No. 33, I. O. O. F. They are the parents of three children: Alva B., Mrs. Hattie Hodges, and James A.
The youngest of the family, James A.
Condy, was born at Angels Camp, Calaveras County, August
25, 1891. He attended the public school
there and when sixteen years old removed to Stockton with his parents, where he
worked with his father in building houses in the northern part of
Stockton. Later, he worked as foreman
for Totten & Trewett,
building contractors, and then he took up interior and exterior
decorating. Skillful and artistic in his
work, he accepts only the highest class contracts, and he has decorated all the
fine homes built by Carl Nelson and some for Frederickson Brothers. He recently completed a three-story building
on Lafayette Street, a three-story business block on West Union Street, the
Cinderella Dance Hall block and many bungalows throughout the city. For the past two years the firm has been
Condy & Haines, paint contractors of Stockton.
Mr. Condy’s
marriage, which occurred on August 29, 1911, united him with Miss Pearl Bodiner, a native of Chicago. One child has been born to them, a daughter,
Nancy Loretta.
Transcribed by V. Gerald Iaquinta.
Source: Tinkham, George
H., History of San Joaquin County, California , Pages
1387-1388. Los Angeles, Calif.: Historic
Record Co., 1923.
© 2012 V. Gerald Iaquinta.
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