San
Joaquin County
Biographies
EMERSON B. HERRICK
One of the best-known and most
popular citizens of the Lodi section of San Joaquin County is Emerson B.
Herrick, who on May 16, 1922, was appointed postmaster of this thriving
city. He is endowed with the talents which
make for leadership among men, and his executive ability and clear-headedness
make him a valuable incumbent of the office of postmaster, in which he gives
universal satisfaction. He was born in
Jackson, Amador County, California, June 30, 1894, a son of Dr. Charles A. and
Lilly Virginia (Robertson) Herrick.
Charles A. Herrick was born in Arcola, Humboldt County, California. Grandfather Isaiah Herrick left his native
state of Maine in 1855 and crossed the plains by ox-team train to
California. Arriving in California, he
went to ranching and in time became an extensive land owned in Humboldt
County. The mother of Emerson Herrick
was born in San Andreas, Calaveras County, California. Her father, Elisha Bryant Robertson, was a
planter in Tennessee and in 1852 came around the Horn to California and settled
at Copperopolis, where he mined for gold and was fairly successful in placer
mining. He married Miss Lucy Sherman,
who came via Panama to California.
Elisha Robertson was one of the first graduates of the Toland Hall, a
college of medicine in San Francisco. He
spent many years practicing medicine among the Indians of Amador and Calaveras
counties, and learned their language and customs. No call for a physician ever went unheeded by
him. Dr. Charles A. Herrick and his good
wife reside in San Francisco, where he has a lucrative dental practice. He has been secretary of the state board of
dental examiners since 1901.
Emerson B. Herrick was reared and
received his early education in Jackson, after which he moved with his parents
to San Francisco. He then entered the
Lowell high school, and after his graduation entered the agricultural
department of the University of California, graduating in 1917 with the B. S.
degree. During the late war, Mr. Herrick
was placed in the United States Geological Survey, Western Department,
including the territory west from Colorado and New Mexico to the Pacific
Coast. The work of this survey was to
reclassify lands in the public domain according to soil and vegetation. Completing this work, he removed to Lodi in
November, 1918, where he took charge, as field manager for the Alameda Sugar
Company, of their entire acreage of 1,600 acres in the Lodi section devoted to
raising beets, etc. Mr. Herrick remained
in charge for one year, and then leased a vineyard of fifty acres seven miles
northwest of Lodi, and also 150 acres of grain land, which he farmed for a
year. In 1921 he was with the
Tracy-Waldron Fruit Company, and one season was spent with the Pacific Fruit Exchange
at Lodi. He then purchased an
eighteen-acre vineyard on the Terminus Road, where he has installed a five-inch
pump with a ten-horse-power motor which affords ample irrigation for the entire
acreage.
On May 1, 1918, at Santa Rosa,
California, Mr. Herrick was married to Miss Adah Smith, a native of that city,
and a daughter of J. C. and Mae (Gibson) Smith, natives of Sonoma County and
Calaveras County, respectively. Mr.
Smith is serving his third term as county assessor of Sonoma County, and for
fourteen years preceding he was deputy assessor of the same county. Mr. and Mrs. Herrick have two children, Adah
Virginia and Robert Emerson. Mr. Herrick
is a Republican in politics; and fraternally, he was made a Mason in Lodi
Lodge, No. 256, F. & A. M., and is also a member of the Eastern Star of
Lodi. He is the president of the Lodi
Lions Club and a director of the San Joaquin County branch of the Federation of
American Farmers. Mrs. Herrick is a
member of the Eastern Star. Both she and
her husband are members of the Episcopal Church in Lodi.
Transcribed by Gerald Iaquinta.
Source: Tinkham, George
H., History of San Joaquin County, California , Pages
1087-1088. Los Angeles, Calif.: Historic
Record Co., 1923.
© 2011 Gerald Iaquinta.
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