Merced County
Biographies
CHARLES BIZZINI
The name of Charles Bizzini was well-known among the successful agriculturists of the Gustine section of Merced County for many years, where he located the year prior to the laying out of the town of Gustine. His birth occurred in Canton Ticino, Switzerland, November 4, 1855, a son of Rafael and Madaline Bizzini, also natives of that country. Charles Bizzini received a common school education in Switzerland and when twenty years old came to California and settled at Cayucos in San Luis Obispo County, where he worked as a ranch laborer; later he removed to Monterey County where he leased land and farmed.
At San Luis Obispo, on September 16, 1885, Mr. Bizzini was married to Miss Delfina Dalidio, also born in Switzerland, daughter of Jacimo Pietro and Mariana (Filippini) Dalidio. Her father had married in Switzerland and during the gold excitement in California came West leaving his family in the old country. He mined for twelve years, then returned to his home and there passed away at the age of fifty years. Mrs. Bizzini's mother lived to be seventy-one years old. There were four children in this family: Angelina, died in Switzerland; Delfina, the wife of our subject; Amelia, still makes her home in Switzerland; Theresa, deceased. Mr. and Mrs. Bizzini lived in Cayucos for three years. In 1906 they removed to Merced County and purchased seventy acres in alfalfa just south of where Gustine now stands; here a residence was built. Later he purchased a nine-acre ranch on which he built a house and this was used as the home place. Mr. and Mrs. Bizzini became the parents of ten children, namely: Elvira and Esther, twins. Elvira is now Mrs. Calanchini, and Esther is Mrs. Zanini, and has four children, Alma, Louis, Henry, and Walter; Dora is now Mrs. Bonta and she has four children, Floyd, George, Mary and Chester. Edward G.; Louis Ralph; Clara is now Mrs. McFaul; Amelia is Mrs. De Martin; Albert Charles; Rosalie is Mrs. Louis P. Taglio; and Nellie D., a graduate of the University of California, taught two years in the Gustine Grammar School and is now a teacher in the Gustine High School. Mr. Bizzini passed away at the family home July 2, 1917. He was an honored member of the Odd Fellows Lodge of Gustine and a good citizen in every sense of the word.
History of Merced County, California – Los Angeles, Historic Record Co., 1925
page 615-616
Transcribed by Kathy Sedler
ANTONE A. SOUZA
The career of Antone A. Souza, who has risen to be one of the largest dairy farmers in Merced County, is of unusual interest. Though of foreign parentage, he was born in Watsonville, Cal., on March 13, 1882, a son of Antone L. and Mary (Day) Souza, both natives of the Azores, the former of St. George and the latter of Flores. The father came to California in the early seventies and worked on ranches, was foreman on the Logan ranch, and also owned fifty acres five miles from Watsonville. He died at the age of sixty-eight; the mother is still living. There were five children in the family, namely: Antone, who died in infancy; Antone A.; Mary, Mrs. Amarante of Gustine; Joseph, deceased; Joseph, at Watsonville. The son Antone A. was educated in the grammar school and the business college in Watsonville, and when he became of age he started out to work for himself as a ranch hand. In 1904 he came to Los Banos, where he was married on September 6, 1904, to Miss Helen Mellow, born in Watsonville, the daughter of Frank and Lucy Mellow both born in the Azores, the father at St. Miguel, where he was a dairyman. They were pioneers of Monterey County, and are now deceased. There were nine children in their family, as follows: Mary, Frank, Lucy, Helen, Antone, Manuel, Joseph, Anna and John. Mrs. Souza was educated in the public schools in Pajaro Valley.
Upon coming to the West Side, Mr. Souza rented James Sweeney's ranch near Los Banos and had a dairy of fifty cows for one year. He then went to Watsonville and worked one season on a hay press, returning to the Cottonwood district where he purchased a quarter interest in a dairy of 100 cows; but four months later he sold it and worked for wages for a year. Then he engaged in a dairy business at Los Banos for a year and a half, when he sold out, and ran a dairy on the Noble Marsh place four months, and one near Dos Palos for nine months. When he sold the latter he bought forty acres of land in the Cottonwood district, but disposed of this and went to Colusa County and with John Westfall ran a dairy on a percentage basis for a year and half. Mr. Souza then moved to a point seven miles below Knight's Landing in Yolo County on the Sacramento River and rented 2000 acres in the region now embraced in the Yolo County By Pass, but on account of the opening of this pass he had to quit this ranch and went to raising hogs and cattle, having about 400 head of each, continuing on one ranch four years. He then came to Cottonwood again and leased 648 acres on which he moved 375 head of cattle and thirty head of horses from Yolo County. The Cottonwood ranch is on the canal about six miles below Gustine. He leases several other ranches among which are the Jameson alfalfa ranch of 166 acres; the McCabe ranch of 320 acres, 200 acres of which are devoted to alfalfa; the Johnson ranch of 160 acres, 100 acres of which are in alfalfa; the Maude Wood's place of 345 acres, 150 acres of which is in alfalfa. He pays out $21,000.00 a year for land he has leased, but he subleases some of these ranches to other tenants for dairies. He now has a herd of 450 dairy cattle and has purchased the J. D. McCarthy ranch of 160 acres. He does some dry farming and has 300 acres in grain about four miles out from Los Banos.
Mr. and Mrs. Souza have no children of their own but have reared the following children taken from the Watsonville orphanage, namely: Robert Pompey, Clifford Jones, Martin Heath, Antone Espinosa, Clifford Marshall, Louis Jensen and Victor Lawrence. In politics Mr. Souza is a Republican. Fraternally he is a member of the U. P. E. C., and of the Eagles of Los Banos.
History of Merced County, California – Los Angeles, Historic Record Co., 1925
page 616-617
Transcribed by Kathy Sedler