San Bernardino County
Biographies
CAPTAIN JOSEPH S. GARCIA.
There is no man in Ontario who is better known or more respected than Captain Joseph S. Garcia. He is a California pioneer of the days of 1849, and has for the past twenty years been identified with the agricultural and horticultural interests of Cucamonga, Etiwanda and Ontario. No history of San Bernardino County would be complete without a more than passing mention of Captain Garcia. He was born on the island of Fayal in 1823. His parents were subjects of Portugal and natives of that island. His youth was spent in acquiring an education until fourteen years of age, and he was then apprenticed to Captain James Woolley, of the ship Louisa of Lynn, Massachusetts, to learn the calling of a mariner or seaman. His first experience was on a whaling voyage, and later in various freighting voyages to different ports of the world. The subject of this sketch was a straightforward, manly youth and an apt scholar, speaking fluently four different languages, viz.: Portuguese, Spanish, English and French. He made rapid progress, and in 1847 was a second officer, and two years later rose to be chief officer of some of the famous packet ships of that day. In 1849 he was chief officer of the large clipper ship "Mary Ellen," bound from Boston to San Francisco, and upon his arrival at the latter port he decided to try life in the new El Dorado of the West. He made his home in San Francisco and in 1850 bought an interest in the schooner "S. D. Bailey" and was placed in command of the vessel in the coasting trade. During the next eighteen years Captain Garcia was actively employed as owner, master, etc., of vessels employed in deep water and coasting voyages from the port of San Francisco. He was well and favorably known in that city. In 1869 he was induced by the Cucamonga vineyard owners to take charge of that plantation, and he took up his residence at that place. In 1871 he purchased a 400-acre tract and engaged in wine-making until 1874, when he sold out to I. W. Hellman, I. M. Hellman, J. G. Downey and B. Dreyfus, for the sum of $45,000, and now it is worth about half a million dollars. He then purchased several claims of Government land and water rights from settlers and built upon and improved the place, and devoted it chiefly to the raising of cattle and sheep. In 1881 he sold this interest to the Chaffey brothers (George and Wm. B.) and they named it Etiwanda. Captain Garcia lived in Cucamonga a year and then bonded 6,500 acres of Cucamonga lands, then owned by a San Francisco company comprising John Archibald, Dr. Henry Gibbons, Sr., Captain Matthew Turner and others, with half the water flowing from San Antonio creek or cañon, for $65,000, to Chaffey brothers. It is now called Ontario. In 1883 the Captain moved to Ontario, his present home, which is a forty-acre tract on the east side of Euclid avenue, between Seventeenth and Eighteenth streets. Since that time he has devoted himself to improving his lands. At this writing he has twenty acres in fruits, classed as follows: five acres in Washington Navel oranges, four to five years old; six acres in French prunes and nine acres in peaches, apricots, apples, pears and other deciduous fruits; twenty acres of his land is devoted to hay and grain.
Captain Garcia has always taken a deep interest in the success of the Ontario colony, and has been a liberal supporter of all enterprises that tended to advance the welfare of the community in which he resides. His straightforward, manly course of life has endeared him in the hearts of a large circle of friends. He is a strong supporter of schools and churches and is a trustee in the First Presbyterian Church of Ontario and was for many years a school trustee in the Cucamonga district. In political matters he is a Republican and has served many times as a delegate in the county conventions; and as a member of the Society of California Pioneers, and also of Phoenix Lodge, F. &. A. M., of San Bernardino.
In 1861 Captain Garcia was united in marriage with Miss Elizabeth L. Ford, a native of Vermont, and the daughter of Caleb Ford, a prominent family of that State.
SOURCE: An Illustrated History of Southern California: Embracing the Counties of San Diego, San Bernardino, Los Angeles and Orange, and the Peninsula of Lower California… Chicago: The Lewis Publishing Company, 1890. p.- 567-568
Transcribed by Kathy Sedler
ISAAC W. WHITAKER
is the pioneer of Ontario. In January, 1883, Mr. Whitaker was a resident of San Francisco, broken in health, and it became a matter of absolute necessity that he seek a mild climate. He decided to try Southern California, and on the 11th day of that month himself and his brave wife pitched their tent upon the land which he has since occupied. The colony lands had been surveyed and work was in progress in grading avenues and piping water, but Mr. and Mrs. Whitaker were the first settlers to occupy the lands. All about them was a barren waste. Not a tree and scarcely a plant was in sight. It was almost disheartening, but with a courage undaunted and a firm belief in the future they went to work to build up a home. Their eyes were soon gladdened by a sight of other settlers, and it seemed but a short time before they actually had neighbors. A little shanty succeeded the tent for a residence, and then a barn was built and occupied as a home, and it was not until 1885 that Mr. Whitaker's neat and comfortable cottage residence was built and occupied. During these years he was engaged in clearing his land and planting trees and vines, and soon he found his desert bidding fair to become a veritable garden of Eden. Mr. Whitaker has planted a large variety of deciduous trees and vines, but this year he is raising a nursery stock of Washington Navel trees which will take the place of his vineyards. His place is under a high state of cultivation, and its varied products find ready market. It is a source of attraction to visitors, not only for its beauty but also because it is the pioneer fruit orchard of the beautiful and productive Ontario.
Mr. Whitaker is a native of Kennebec County, Maine, dating his birth in 1841. He is the son of James and Dorcas (Mitchell) Whitaker. His father was a well-known farmer of that county, and for over forty years was a Justice of the Peace in his township. The subject of this sketch was educated in the schools of his native place and reared to farm life. In 1862 he entered the service of his country as a private in Company G, Twenty-fourth Maine Volunteers, and served in the Department of the Gulf. He was engaged in the siege of Port Hudson, and after that was on garrison duty at Vicksburg until the expiration of his term of service in 1863, when he was honorably discharged and returned to his home. In 1864 he came by steamer to California and located in Santa Clara County, and there engaged in farming and horticultural pursuits until 1872. In that year he moved to San Francisco, where he engaged in various occupations, among which was that of a hotel keeper, until failing health compelled his leaving for his present residence.
Mr. Whitaker has never lost his faith in the future prosperity of Ontario, and has always been ready to aid in all movements tending to place its varied resources before the world. He is an energetic and progressive citizen, and is entitled to the respect and esteem of the community which his consistent course of life has given him. He is a member of Ontario Post, No. 124, G. A. R., and also of Central Lodge, No. 45, F. & A. M., of China, Maine.
In 1862 Mr. Whitaker married Miss Deborah Grafton, a native of Maine. She died in 1870, leaving one child, Fannie E., now Mrs. Charles Goodrich, of Skowhegan, Maine. In 1882 he was united in marriage with Mrs. Hettie Swart, (nee Hill), a native of Elmira, New York.
SOURCE: An Illustrated History of Southern California: Embracing the Counties of San Diego, San Bernardino, Los Angeles and Orange, and the Peninsula of Lower California… Chicago: The Lewis Publishing Company, 1890. p.- 568-569
Transcribed by Kathy Sedler