San
Joaquin County
Biographies
FRANK F. PARKER
A prominent stockman
who is also a native son of Stanislaus County, is Frank F. Parker, engaged in
stockraising on 1,300 acres of range and farming land located seventeen miles
east of Stockton on the Copperopolis railroad, who raises only the choicest of
beef cattle and supplies the leading markets in the state. His birth occurred on Rock Creek, about five
miles east of Farmington, June 25, 1858.
His father was Captain John Parker, a native of New Bedford,
Massachusetts, who came to California in 1849, where he mined and farmed until
the time of his death in 1868. Captain
Parker was master of the ship “Vermont,” and during the years spent at sea had
touched every notable port in the world.
He sailed to California via Cape Horn in 1849 and spent four years in
the mines; then, in 1853, he went to Australia, where he was married to Miss
Clara Bevan, a native of County Cork, Ireland, who had
accompanied her people to that country in 1851.
Mrs. Parker accompanied her husband on his voyages, and on their trip in
1854 their eldest son was born and they gave him the name of John Vermont; his
birth occurred on December 20, 1854, as the ship rounded Cape Horn. After a stormy voyage they arrived in the
port of San Francisco and went direct to Stockton; then Captain Parker went to
the mines at Sonora and Jamestown, where he spent a short time, and then
settled at Telegraph City, Calaveras County where he took up Government land
near Rock Creek, but continued mining.
In 1864 he came to San Joaquin County and began sheepraising; and here
he died. After his death, Mrs. Parker
purchased land near Peters, and the Parker home was established at the old
Uncle George Tavern, seventeen miles east of Stockton, where our subject now
lives. Additions have been made to the
building until it is now modern in every way.
Mrs. Parker died in 1895, leaving an estate consisting of 400 acres,
which is included in Mr. Parker’s ranch.
Frank Parker was reared to farm
life, and while still a young lad herded sheep and
rode the range. He recalls distinctly
the twenty-mule teams used by the freighters to the mines, and John Wilson and
L. Kenyon, who drove bull teams, won his particular admiration. When thirteen years old he started shearing
sheep, and each season thereafter for twenty-five years he followed this
occupation, going from the ranges of California to Nevada.
In 1890, at Stockton, Mr. Parker was
united him marriage with Miss Emily Jenkins, born at Jenny Lind, California, a
daughter of Hon. Robert R. Jenkins, prominent political leader in central
California in the eighties. They are the
parents of two children: Uretta is the wife of John Dentoni,
residing in Stockton; Julia Vera is the wife of Emilio Sanguinetti, and they
have two children, Parker and Uretta. From 1900 to 1906 Mr. Parker owned and
conducted the Lockeford Hotel at Lockeford, and then increased his landholdings
by purchasing 740 acres surrounding the old Parker homestead. He now owns 1,300 acres of range and farming
land in one body, where he engages exclusively in raising high-grade cattle for
market. Since he was twenty-one years
old, Mr. Parker has been a member of the I. O. O. F., and he is also identified
with the Knights of Pythias lodge of Lockeford.
Transcribed by Gerald Iaquinta.
Source: Tinkham, George
H., History of San Joaquin County, California , Page
1175. Los Angeles, Calif.: Historic
Record Co., 1923.
© 2011 Gerald Iaquinta.
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