San
Joaquin County
Biographies
LOUIS R. SANGUINETTI
Prominent among the most
enterprising firms of San Joaquin County are the Sanguinetti Brothers, the
successful vineyardists and independent packers of table grapes of Lodi,
worthily represented by Louis R. Sanguinetti, a native of that county where he
was born on May 13, 1877. His father,
Stephen Sanguinetti, a native of Italy, now deceased, came to America in early
days and tried his luck at mining; but it did not suit him, so he located in
Stockton, in the early ‘60s. He was
given hard work in vegetable garden at fifteen dollars per month. With his savings he bought land in the Delta
district near that city, and engaged in farming; and he erected a brick house
of thirteen rooms, and improved the place with flowers, palms and a garden,
making it one of the show-places in pioneer times. Some forty years ago, he bought the old Ayers
Vineyard located on the Woodbridge Road, north of Lodi, and both of these
places are still owned by the family.
Stephen Sanguinetti married Miss Geronima Largomassino, and he was
an exemplary husband, father, neighbor and friend. Several children were born to Mrs. and Mrs.
Sanguinetti: Fred, Louis R., the subject
of our review; Henry, and Silvia. A daughter,
Anna, married a gentleman of the same family name; Rose became Mrs. Vignola;
and Palmira married J. Mezzera.
Louis, after finishing school,
worked for awhile with his father on the home ranch, and when it was found that
the Ayers Vineyard was not doing well, he was sent by his father to take charge
of the place. From that time, the Ayers
Ranch began to be a paying property, through the young man’s able management;
although he was only twenty-one when, in 1898, he took charge of it. This vineyard is one of the oldest in the
county, some of the vines being sixty years old. It has sixty-five acres of Black Prince,
Mission, Muscat, and Tokay grapes, and there is also a second orchard. With a brother, Henry, Mr. Sanguinetti packs
independently under the brand name of Sanguinetti Bros., and this brand tops
the prices in nineteen out of twenty cars shipped east. Mr. Sanguinetti has a one-third interest,
with W. A. Spooner and James Anderson in a vineyard of eighty-seven acres; he
also owns valuable real estate in Stockton, including two business blocks, and
in 1922, the completed the Traveler’s Hotel at Lodi.
At Stockton November 27, 1900, Mr.
Sanguinetti was married to Miss Tillie Sturla, a
daughter of Paul Sturla; an early settler in Lodi, whose rise and success is
portrayed elsewhere in this volume.
Melvin Stephen, the elder son who graduated at the head of his class at
the Lodi high school in 1921, is now a student at Stanford University, and
Allen Paul, the younger son, attends the Lodi grammar school.
Transcribed by Gerald Iaquinta.
Source: Tinkham, George
H., History of San Joaquin County, California , Page
871. Los Angeles, Calif.: Historic
Record Co., 1923.
© 2011 Gerald Iaquinta.
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