San Joaquin County
Biographies
HIRAM NEWTON RUCKER, M. D.
HIRAM NEWTON RUCKER, M. D.,
Superintendent of the State Asylum for the Insane at Stockton, was born in
Saline County, Missouri, September 6, 1844, a son of William Taliaferro and
Veranda S. (Taylor) Rucker. Both parents were natives of Orange County,
Virginia, his father born in March, 1809, and his mother in January, 1810. They
were such near neighbors that they attended the same school in their youth. The
Taylor family, who were relatives of President Taylor, moved first to Kentucky
and thence to Missouri,. Thither also went William T.
Rucker in young manhood, and there he was married to Miss Taylor in 1830. They
first settled in Howard County, and in 1832 moved to Saline County. They had
twelve children, of whom one died in infancy, and eleven are living. William T.
Rucker took up land in Saline County, and went to farming, at which he there
continued until he set out for California with his family in 1852. He drove
three wagons drawn by oxen and a herd of 200 cows, across the plains, coming by
way of Sublette’s cut off, north of Salt Lake City, for the better pasturing of
his stock, and arrived in Santa Clara County early in November, having been
about five months on the road. The cows, which averaged perhaps $10 a head in
Missouri, he sold, after his arrival, for $150 and upwards, and the oxen for about
$500 a yoke. He bought 160 acres and put in a crop that season, paying eight
cents a pound for seed wheat, but when he harvested eighty bushels to the acre
in 1853 he was reconciled to the high price of the seed. This ranch was
situated about two and one-half miles southwest of Santa Clara, and was sold
about 1858, when he bought one of 225 acres, about one mile from the first,
which he held until 1857, when he retired to a home he had bought in the town
of Santa Clara. There he died in 1879, much respected in all the relations of
life, a man of temperate habits and a consistent member of the Methodist Church
South from his youth up. His widow still survives, on the old homestead. Her
mother lived to an advanced age, being over eighty years at her death.
H. N. Rucker, the subject of this sketch, arriving in California at the age of eight years, was educated in the local school, and in his youth rendered some service on his father’s farm. At twenty-one years he entered the University of the Pacific at Santa Clara, where he received an academic education for three and one-half years. Concluding to enter the medical profession he commenced his studies in the office of Dr. A. B. Caldwell, and attended lectures in the Toland Medical College in San Francisco, which afterward became the medical department of the University of California, and was graduated from that institution November 11, 1870. He first located as a practicing physician in Plainsburg, Merced County, where he remained until June, 1875. He then moved to the town of Merced, where he formed a partnership with the late Dr. W. A. Washington, which existed until 1881, under the style of Washington & Rucker. After the dissolution of that partnership Dr. Rucker continued to practice in Merced until elected Superintendent of the Stockton Insane Asylum, at the meeting of the directors in October, 1888. He had meanwhile been appointed a member of the board of directors by Governor Stoneman, in March, 1885. He entered on the discharge of his onerous and responsible duties on November 1, 1888.
Dr. Rucker was married in 1873 to Miss
Emma Frances Abbott, born in Lawrence, Massachusetts, in 1853, a daughter of
Orson and Eliza A. (Foster) Abbott. Her father came to California in 1859, and
mined for some years. About 1865 he went East and
returned with his family. The Abbott and Foster families have been settled in
New England for several generations. Mr. and Mrs. Rucker have one child, Ella
Robin, born September 6, 1884.
Dr. H. N. Rucker belongs to the Masonic
fraternity, and has filled several elective offices in the Grand Lodge: Junior
Warden in 1884 - ‘85; Senior Warden in 1886; Deputy Grand Master in 1887, and
Grand Master in 1888.
Transcribed by: Jeanne Sturgis Taylor.
An Illustrated History of San Joaquin County,
California, Pages 402-403. Lewis Pub. Co. Chicago, Illinois 1890.
© 2009 Jeanne Sturgis Taylor.
Golden Nugget Library's San Joaquin County
Biographies
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