Kings County
Biographies
WILLIAM F. BERNSTEIN
As a baker and also as a stock-raiser William F. Bernstein has achieved a high standing in Kings county, Cal., and his bakery at Hanford and his stock farm near that town are among the best, each in its class, of their respective kinds in Central California. Mr. Bernstein was born in Ohio, near the old town of Lebanon, Warren county, in April, 1873, and there was reared to manhood and educated in common schools and at a normal school, and began teaching some years before he attained his majority. He was twenty-three when he came to Hanford and found employment in the bakery establishment of Fred Bader. Three years later he bought a one-half interest in the business and at the expiration of another three years he became its sole proprietor. Since then he has been its able manager and has developed it commensurately with the growth of the town. He handles a general line of first-class bakery goods and his ice-cream and candies have won a reputation which keeps them in constant demand. His business occupies a two-story and basement building which takes up a ground space of 25 x 150 feet and employs in its various departments twenty-one skilled workers.
Adjoining the city on the southeast is a ranch of six acres which is the property of Mr. Bernstein, and he owns forty acres located a mile west of the city on which he breeds thoroughbred registered Poland-China hogs, as well as saddle horses which are in high favor with discriminating users of animals bred and trained for such service. He has exhibited his thoroughbred hogs at various local fairs. His entire ranch is devoted to alfalfa and to the feeding and development of the stock mentioned.
In the promotion and organization of the Kings County Chamber of Commerce Mr. Bernstein was influential, and he was elected its first president and re-elected to that office in December, 1911. In a fraternal way he affiliates with the Masons, being a Templar and a Shriner, and also with the Hanford Camp, Woodmen of the World. As a citizen he is helpful to all worthy local interests, ready at all times to do his full share in the encouragement of the development of the town. He was married, May 28, 1902, to Mary Pearl Trewhitt, who was born in Tennessee, but had been brought to Hanford by her parents. Her mother, Mrs. Elizabeth Trewhitt, is a resident of that city.
History of Tulare and Kings Counties, California with Biographical Sketches - Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company, 1913
pp. 625-626
Transcribed by Kathy Sedler
J. A. CRAWSHAW, M.D.
While giving attention to general practice Dr. J. A. Crawshaw specializes along lines safely and sanely within the limits of the field of the family physician. His residence and office are in the Bissell Building, Hanford, Kings county, Cal. Born August 10, 1879, at Carbondale, Ill., he was there educated in the public schools and in the state normal school in the usual courses of such institutions. When advanced sufficiently in his professional studies, he matriculated in the medical department of the University of Illinois at Chicago in 1901, and after passing the prescribed examinations was duly graduated therefrom with the degree of M.D., June 5, 1905. After eighteen months devoted to the practice of his profession at Murphysboro, he came in 1907 to Hanford, where he has since prospered increasingly as a general practitioner of medicine and surgery, specializing in diseases of the eye, ear, nose and throat.
Dr. Crawshaw is a director of the Hanford Sanitorium, which he helped to organize and which is now in the course of construction. It is a modern structure, costing $30,000, and is to be completed February 1, 1913. The Doctor holds membership in the Fresno Medical Society, the San Joaquin Medical Society and the California State Medical Society. He is identified with the Kings County Auto Association, is a Blue Lodge, Royal Arch and Eastern Star Mason, a Forester of America and a member of the Independent Order of Foresters and its ladies' auxiliary order, a Modern Woodman, a member of the order of Fraternal Aid and of the Portuguese orders of U. P. E. C. and of I. D. E. S. In all of these societies he takes a helpful interest, greeting their members in fraternal brotherhood and advancing their many good works in every way possible.
Beside his professional work Dr. Crawshaw has found some time to devote to other interests, notably to ranching. He owns a farm of one hundred acres, eight miles north of Hanford, all under irrigation and devoted to stock-raising. At this time he is arranging to give special attention to the breeding of mules.
In 1904 Dr. Crawshaw married Miss Bessie Hagler, who was then a resident of Illinois. They have an interesting little daughter named Alleen.
The Doctor, although an adopted son of California and a comparatively late arrival to the city of Hanford, yet enters heartily into the political and social life of Kings county. He took part in the program of the "Kings County Karnival" in May, 1911, and rendered an original poem on the birth of Kings county, from which we quote the following:
" 'Twas in the spring of ninety-three,
In the county then of Tu-lar-e,
With division talk on every tongue,
That the battle of politics was sprung.
Fast the missiles flew each way,
Until the twenty-third of May,
When Captain Blakely with his dart
Plunged the weapon in their heart.
"With the sun still shining in the skies,
And the tears undried in the mother's eyes,
Out from the wounded, bleeding heart,
The "Baby County" made a start,
To spread afar its honored fame
And win itself a Christian name,
Whose echo o'er the plain would ring,
In honor of our Baby King."
History of Tulare and Kings Counties, California with Biographical Sketches - Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company, 1913
pp. 629-630
Transcribed by Kathy Sedler