San
Joaquin County
Biographies
DAVID WILEY MILLER
A successful land owner and
substantial horticulturist, in the enjoyment of a handsome competence, David
Wiley Miller has resided in San Joaquin County for the past twenty-seven years
and enjoys the esteem of all who know him.
His valuable ranch of 130 acres, known as the “Calaveras River
Orchards,” is located two miles north of Linden on the old Waterloo Road,
fifteen miles east of Stockton. When Mr.
Miller located in the county in 1896 there were no commercial orchards in the
Linden section. Now there are over 3,000
acres devoted to the raising of walnuts, almonds, peaches, plums, prunes, and
apricots. In 1904 Mr. Miller began to
raise English walnuts, and each year more acreage is being planted with these
trees. Two and a half miles from Mr.
Miller’s ranch a walnut orchard of 540 acres is being developed.
David Wiley Miller was born in
Northampton, Massachusetts, December 14, 1850, the youngest child of David and
Martha (Graves) Miller, both natives of Massachusetts. David Wiley received a good education in the
schools of his native state, and at twenty-five years of age left home for
California, traveling via Panama. He
worked on the construction of the road to Mount Hamilton; then entered the
employ of the San Jose Argus, a daily published in that city, where he remained
for a short time; and then went into the office of the San Jose Herald as
business manager, which occupied him for the next seven years. Indoor employment proved detrimental to his
health, and consequently he resigned his position with the Herald and became a
deputy county assessor under L. A. Spitzer, where he remained for fourteen
years. This position afforded Mr. Miller
a splendid opportunity to become conversant with horticulture in the Santa
Clara Valley. He purchased five acres
near Cupertino, which he developed to orchard and later sold to good
advantage. He then reinvested in San
Jose and Saratoga property, each time selling at a good profit. When he located in San Joaquin County, in
1896, he purchased the old Cogswell place of 175 acres, in partnership with
Joseph H. Hunt, of Hunt Brothers, canners.
He cleared the land of the heavy timber and set out an orchard, and as
the years went by he set more and more acres to fruit. Mr. Miller sold his interest in this ranch to
the Hunt Brothers in 1910, when he located on his present home place, which he
has purchased and improved. This is the
pioneer orchard in the Linden section, named “Calaveras River Orchard.” He also owns 400 acres of land north of
Linden.
Mr. Miller’s marriage occurred in
San Jose in 1892, when he was married to Miss Jennie G. Pound, a native of
Iowa. She and her mother, Frances
(Bates) Pound, were prominent educators in San Jose, where they conducted Mrs.
Pound’s Private School on William Street for many years. Mrs. Miller is a graduate of the San Jose
State Normal, class of 1887. Three
children have been born to Mrs. and Mrs. Miller: Raymond W. is a graduate of the San Jose
State Normal School, and saw service during the World War; he is married and
has one daughter, Ruth Genevieve. He has
an eighty-acre orchard at Linden.
Margaret Frances, also a graduate of San Jose Normal, is a teacher at
Linden; and David William is a student in Linden Union High School.
Three years ago a local group of men
met and organized a Linden Walnut Growers’ Association, now affiliated with the
California Walnut Growers’ Association, Mr. Miller serving as vice-president of
the local organization. Mr. Miller was a
prime mover in securing electricity and telephone service for Linden, and is a
director in the local telephone company.
He has been active in the good-roads movement, a director of the Farm
Bureau, president of the Linden High School, and president of the building
committee for the new church at Linden.
Mr. Miller was elected a member of the assembly of the State Legislature
for the 19th district in 1918.
In the session of 1919 he stood for the enforcement of the 18th
Amendment, and was a member of the committee on education, public morals, and
constitutional amendments. Mrs. Miller
is a member of the W. C. T. U. and the Linden Methodist Episcopal Church, and
is prominent in social and civic affairs.
Mr. Miller is an active Rotarian, a member of the Rotary Club,
Stockton. In politics he is a Democrat.
Transcribed by Gerald Iaquinta.
Source: Tinkham, George
H., History of San Joaquin County, California , Page
1131. Los Angeles, Calif.: Historic
Record Co., 1923.
© 2011 Gerald Iaquinta.
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