Yolo County
Biographies
DANIEL FARNHAM
A very prominent and
successful farmer and dairyman of Yolo county is Daniel Farnham,
who lives two and a half miles southeast of Woodland. His grandfather, Benjamin
Farnham, native of New York state,
and a soldier in the war of 1812, died in Van Buren county, Mich. His father,
Daniel, was born in New York state, from there going
to Michigan, where he followed farming until 1850. In that year he came to this
state across the plains with his eldest son, Horace, and after three years
engaged in mining, returned to Michigan, where he owned a farm of two hundred
and forty acres. In 1859 he again came across the plains to California, at
first renting his Michigan farm, but later selling it. Until 1865 he worked in
the mines, but in that year he abandoned mining and went to live with his son
Daniel, at whose home he died when eighty-six years of age. He was a member of
the Methodist Episcopal Church, and a Republican in his political sympathies.
Mrs. Farnham, formerly Naomi Rice, was born in Ohio,
the daughter of Seth Rice, who died there. Mrs. Farnham
died in Yolo county, this state, when well advanced in
years, having become the mother of three daughters and two sons, of whom one
daughter is deceased.
Daniel Farnham
was born in Cass county Mich., October 22, 1839, and brought up on his father’s
farm, going to school when he could, but in all, attended school only about six
months. When he was about twenty years of age he and his father started for the
west by way of Pike’s Peak, with a wagon and four yoke of oxen, and after many
adventures and delays they arrived in this state, settling for a time in
Placerville, where they engaged in mining at $2 per day. When Mr. Farnham first came to this state he had only $1.50 left,
and was confronted with hard times, work of any kind being hard to find. While looking for work one day he saw a man
trying to fill a gap in a mining ditch, but as he was unsuccessful Mr. Farnham assisted him. By throwing a large log into the
breach and afterward vigorously using the shovel he soon filled the gap The man
whom he had thus assisted hired him on the spot, paying him the average wage,
$2 per day, out of which he had to board himself, but this gave him a start,
and from that time to the present he has been very successful. In the early
days of his sojourn in this state he prospected for himself at Pilot Hill, but
the water giving out there he came to Woodland, leaving soon afterward,
however, for Woolsey’s Flat, in Sierra county, where he engaged in hydraulic
mining, continuing there three years. Abandoning mining, he purchased a team
and engaged in the freighting business between Sacramento and points in Nevada,
continuing in this occupation about two years.
In 1865 Mr. Farnham
was married in Yolo county to Silvina Dopking, who was a native of Van Buren county, Mich., and
the daughter of Daniel Dopking, who was a pioneer
settler of California. She passed away March 25, 1904, at the home place. Nine
children were born of this union, viz: Harry, who died when only nine months
old; Frank, who assists his father with farm and dairy; Marcia, who was
accidentally killed by the explosion of a lamp when eighteen years of age;
Harvey, Noah, Claude, Ira, Maude, the five last mentioned at home; and one
child who died in infancy. The year Mr. Farnham was
married he located in Yolo county, where he purchased one hundred and sixty
acres of land which was at that time a grain field. This he improved, erecting
upon it a comfortable residence and other buildings. In 1893 he leveled this
farm and put it in alfalfa, which averages four and five crops a year, the
fields also furnishing pasture land for his stock. Besides carrying on a stock
and hay business he has a fine dairy of forty-five cows. Before the
organization of the Woodland Creamery Company, of which he was one of the
originators, his butter brought him fifty cents per pound. When prices were low
he packed his butter, at one time selling one thousand pounds to Frank S.
Freeman at fifty cents per pound, netting him $500. Since the organization of
the creamery company, his butter averages about thirty cents per pound. Mr. Farnham also owns three hundred and fifty acres of land
adjoining the John Bemmerly property, seven miles
northwest of Woodland, one hundred and fifty acres of which are under
irrigation, forty acres in alfalfa and the remainder in grain, in addition to
which he runs a dairy of twenty cows. He is an exceptionally successful
dairyman, and is developing all his land as rapidly as possible for dairy
purposes. For ten years. Mr. Farnham was school
trustee in the Spring Lake district. His religious views coincide with the rule
of faith as laid down by the Methodist Episcopal Church, of which he is a
member. He is president of the Farmers’ Central Water Company, of which he is
also manager. A man who stands very high in his community, Mr. Farnham has won his way to his present financial success by
his individual efforts, a self-made man in the truest acceptation of the term.
Transcribed
By: Cecelia M. Setty.
Source: "History
of the State of California and Biographical Record of the Sacramento
Valley, Cal.," J.
M. Guinn, Pages 595-596. The Chapman Publishing Company, Chicago,
1906.
© 2017 Cecelia M. Setty.
Golden
Nugget Library's Yolo County Biographies