Yolo County
Biographies
JACOB SNYDER
The youth of Germany who is tempted to seek his fortune under the protection of the Stars and Stripes, and who arrives at his new scene of activity with little save the clothes on his back in the way of material assets, should find encouragement from the career of Jacob Snyder, a California pioneer of 1857, and the owner of eleven hundred and seventy-four acres of grain land in Yolo county, and five hundred and seventy-eight acres on Putah creek, Solano county. This honored early settler is now taking a more leisurely view of life, owing to having strong and reliant sons who inherit his thrift and determination, and who have a long since stepped into his place as active managers of the extensive property. His own life, however, has been one of unceasing toil and economy, and each year has witnessed a surer grasp upon the splendid resources for which this particular part of the state is noted. In harvest time his farms present a picture of enterprise and modern labor-saving methods entirely western, and that a steady hand is at the helm, directing its affairs with discretion and wisdom, is apparent to all permitted to witness the gathering of the grain.
Mr. Snyder was born in Ludwigsburg, a town eight miles north of Stuttgart, Wurtemberg, Germany, November 15, 1831, his parents, George and Barbara (Bower) Snyder, being natives of Wittenberg. He was reared on his parents’ farm for many years, and there his father died in 1847, at the age of sixty-six, and his mother at the age of seventy. Of their four daughters and two sons, but survive, Jacob and his sister, Mrs. Barbara Binder, of Chicago, Ill., who formerly lived on a farm forty miles from that city. Jacob went away from home at the age of six to attend school in a nearby town, but when still young returned to take charge of the farm because of his father’s death. In 1854 he arranged his affairs and set sail in the vessel bound for America, spending three months in Hoboken, N. J., and then leaving for Marion county, Ohio. There he engaged in farming until the spring of 1857, when he went to New York and took a steamer for Panama, and from there came to San Francisco. His first employment in the west was on a farm in Yuba county, and in 1858 he removed to Butte county and took charge of the twenty-six hundred acre farm of Robert Turner.
Owing to fever and ague Mr. Snyder took a trip back to Marion county, Ohio, in 1862, and the following year married Fredericka Keller, who was also born in Wurtemberg, and who had gone to Marion county to join her brother. Soon after the ceremony Mr. Snyder started out with a four horse team and wagon to cross the plains with his wife, traveling alone until reaching Iowa City, where they joined a train and were four months on the way to the west. Stopping near Reno, Nev., on the Truckee river, he rented a ranch and engaged in farming until 1866, and then came to California and rented a ranch near the Colusa line in Yolo county. In 1868 he bought a ranch of one hundred and sixty acres near his present home, six miles northeast of Davisville, and in 1876 located where he now is, and where he had eleven hundred and seventy-four acres under cultivation. His staple product on this farm and also on the one between Davisville and Winters, is grain, although general farming is carried on to some extent, and an orchard and garden are maintained for family use.
There are seven children grown to maturity, of whom William is a carpenter of Woodland; George occupies and manages his father’s ranch near Madison; Rosa is the wife of Charles Bonath of Crawford county, Ohio; and Jacob, Charles, Fred and Lewis, are living on the home place. Mr. Snyder is a Republican in politics, and for twenty years has been a member of the school board. He is the stanch friend of education, and has given his children the best training afforded in his neighborhood. He is one of the most substantial and reliable men of this section, and is a typical representative of the German-American citizen who realizes his expectations because he has the force of character and determination required for the same.
Transcribed by Joyce Rugeroni.
Source: "History of the State of California and
Biographical Record of the Sacramento Valley, Cal.," J. M.
Guinn, Pages 596-599. The Chapman
Publishing Company, Chicago, 1906.
© 2017 Joyce Rugeroni.
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Nugget Library's Yolo County Biographies