HENRY J. BRUNNIER

Henry J. Brunnier.  In his profession as a structural engineer, Henry J. Brunnier has designed and supervised some of the most notable work in this line on the Pacific coast in recent years.  Mr. Brunnier was sent to San Francisco by a New York engineering firm on May 4, 1906, two weeks after the great fire.  Since 1908 he has been in business there for himself.  He was born in Manning, Iowa, November 26, 1882, son of Martin and Caroline (Meyer) Brunnier.  His grandfather Brunnier was born in France, while the Meyer family is of Danish ancestry.  Martin Brunnier was a farmer in Iowa, later a merchant at Manning, and served as mayor of that town.

     Henry J. Brunnier, one of three children, two of whom are living, spent the first ten years of his life on his father's Iowa farm.  After that he lived at Manning, attended public schools, graduated from high school in 1900, and soon afterward entered Iowa State College at Ames.  He was a student of engineering there, and graduated in 1904.  Soon after leaving college, Mr. Brunnier entered the engineering service of the American Bridge Company at Pittsburgh.  A year later he removed to New York City and became a structural engineer with the New York Edison Company.

     The firm of Ford, Bacon & Davis, one of the large engineering corporations of New York, with branch offices in San Francisco, sent him to the Pacific coast in May, 1906, and for two years he remained with that firm.  In 1908 he began the individual practice of his profession.  Since then Mr. Brunnier has designed the first concrete piers and seawalls for the San Francisco Harbor Commission, utilizing concrete instead of the old wooden structures.  He is designer of the Young Men's Christian Association at San Diego, a building that attracted much attention in engineering journals on account of its originality and departure from the usual types.  He also designed the Marston Department Store at San Diego, the American Can Company and Examiner Building at Los Angeles, and the Shredded Wheat Company's plant at Oakland.  Mr. Brunnier is patentee of a hanging fender for docks, and was called to Honolulu to install these fenders on the piers of that city.  For a number of years Mr. Brunnier has had an extensive general engineering practice, involving a great deal of work besides the larger enterprises just mentioned.  At Santa Cruz he designed a timber wharf extending 3,000 feet out in the open sea.  Predictions were made that the wharf was impractical, but eight years of test has proved its seaworthiness.  At San Francisco,Mr. Brunnier designed the Memorial Golden Gate Museum for M. H. de Young, the Civic Center Library, the Gantner and Mattern knitting factory, the meat packing plant of the Virden Packing Company and numerous structures for the Standard Oil Company, one of the most important of which is the new office building, the largest of many large buildings of San Francisco.  He also designed the Sharon Building and other structures for the Sharon estate, the Balfour-Guthrie Building, the California Insurance Building, the Federal Reserve Bank Building, the Holbrook, Merrill & Stetson Warehouse and several warehouses for the Haslett Warehouse Company.  Mr. Brunnier has designed and constructed a number of bridges in Humboldt County, one of which is the bridge spanning the South River at Port Kenyon.  This bridge contains the largest concrete girder span in the world.  The span being 142 feet in length.

     During the World war Mr. Brunnier left his office on a twenty-four hour notice, and going to Washington, was associated with Rudolph Wig in charge of all concrete ship construction by the Government.

     Mr. Brunnier is a member of the American Society of Civil Engineers, Pacific Association of Consulting Engineers, the American Concrete Institute, American Wood Preservers Association.  He is a Tau Beta Pi, and Phi Kappa Phi, was elected to the honorary college association of the Cardinal Guild, is past master of Davidson Lodge, Free and Accepted Masons, is a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason and Shriner, is past president of the San Francisco Rotary Club, and past district governor and past international vice president of Rotary, is a member of the San Francisco Commercial Club, the Engineers Club, Old Colony Club, Chamber of Commerce, president of Lake Merced Golf and Country Club and Crystal Springs Golf Club.

     In 1905 Mr. Brunnier married Miss Ann Weideman.  They have one son, Henry, now attending Stanford University.

Transcribed by Marilyn R. Pankey.

FRANCIS BUCKLEY

Among the notable pioneers of San Francisco was Francis Buckley, who when a young man was largely influenced by an ambitious and adventurous inclination.  He was born in the famous City of Cork, Ireland, on June 2, 1817, and was there reared and educated.

Upon reaching his majority he concluded to leave the Fatherland and started in the early part of 1838 for Sydney, Australia, where he landed in the latter part of that year.  He married in Sydney in December, 1841, and after remaining there for about four or five years, the climatic conditions being unfavorable to the health of both, he embarked across the Pacific Ocean for Valparaiso, Chile, where he arrived in 1843.  He remained in Valparaiso until the latter part of 1848, where he followed the carpentering and contracting business, constructing many of the Government buildings in that city.

He heard of the gold discoveries in California, its magnificent climatic conditions and opportunities, and sailed from Valparaiso in the later part of 1848 on the sailing vessel "Chateau Brian," arriving in San Francisco on April 18, 1849.  Here he found hundreds of gold seekers swarming the coast, but determined that his best opportunities would be found in the City of San Francisco, where he remained following the contracting business, building many of the prominent edifices of those early days.

 He made both life and business a success and was involved in all the historic and laudable movements to build up a fine city and a sound government, and stood high as a substantial citizen.  He was one of the charter members of the Society of California Pioneers.  As stated, he married while in Australia on December 28, 1841, Miss Honora Guerin, and to them was born thirteen children, of whom nine reached maturity as follows:  Mary, Francis J., Joseph A., Honora A., Daniel J., Gertrude M., Ambrose J., Agnes J. and Elizabeth A.

 Mr. and Mrs. Buckley celebrated their fifty-ninth wedding anniversary in San Francisco.

Mrs. Buckley passed away in May 1900, and was followed by Mr. Buckley in May, 1901.

Louise E. Shoemaker, Transcriber April 29, 2004

LIZZIE KENNEDY BURKE

Lizzie KENNEDY BURKE.  Lizzie KENNEDY BURKE, a distinguished member of a remarkable family whose careers reflect honor upon San Francisco was the sixth child in the family of Eliza King KENNEDY, wife of Thomas KENNEDY of Navan, County Meath, Ireland.

In 1849, Mrs. KENNEDY, her mother, then a widow, arranged to bring her family of one son and six daughters to America, and by 1851 they had all arrived in New York.  They then started for San Francisco, Anne and Alice by way of Cape Horn, Lizzie and Mary by way of Nicaragua, Mrs.  KENNEDY with Kate and Delia and Patrick came late by way of Nicaragua.  Before the close of 1854 they had all settled in San Francisco, where the KENNEDY’s became one of the best known families of the early days and through their own achievements and the achievements of their descendants they have remained prominent in the life of the city and state.

In 1866 Miss KENNEDY married William Francis BURKE, a native of Cork, Ireland.  He was for a long time in the shoe business, but for the later years of his life was assistant manager of the San Francisco Clearing House.  He was a well known figure in the business and banking life of the city.

Mrs. Lizzie KENNEDY BURKE is a most remarkable woman.  With two of her sisters, Alice and Kate, she entered the school department of San Francisco in 1857.  Alice left the department upon her marriage to James LYNCH, but Kate and Lizzie remained. Kate until her death in 1890 and Lizzie until her retirement from the school department in 1914 after fifty-seven years of distinguished service.

During these years of service she held many prominent positions in the department.  For many years she was vice principal of the Union Primary Cosmopolitan Grammar School.  Later she was principal of the Union Primary School, and for over twenty years, to the close of her career, she was principal of the Columbia Grammar School.  Thousands of citizens of San Francisco have passed under her teaching, and men and women in all walks of the city’s life look back upon their days with her with pleasure, and still hold her a welcome guest in their homes and in their offices.  There is not a large or powerful organization in San Francisco today that does not number among its influential members former pupils of Lizzie KENNEDY BURKE.

During her service in the schools Mrs. Burke conceived and planned and with the help of her sister, Kate KENNEDY, organized the Teachers’ Mutual Aid Society of San Francisco.  This association was the first of its kind.  It is now in its fifty-first year, and is still practical, solvent and successful, a monument to the foresight of its founders and a model for other associations of similar character throughout the United States and England.

Mrs. BURKE has the further distinction of having served as the only woman member of the Charter Committee of One Hundred, convened to draft the city chapter in 1898, which later became the present organic law of San Francisco.

There were four children in the BURKE family;  Katherine Delmar BURKE, founder and principal of Miss BURKE’s School for Girls; Elizabeth King BURKE, now deceased, who was the wife of the late Jere T. BURKE of the law department of the Southern Pacific Company; William Francis BURKE, assistant postmaster of San Francisco; and John Kennedy BURKE, general superintendent of the Baker, Hamilton & Pacific Company of San Francisco.

Elizabeth and Jere BURKE left a family of seven minor children.  Mrs. BURKE assumed the guardianship of these children.  Four have now attained their majority.  Sherman, the eldest, is a captain in the United States Army; having entered the army service during the World war; Barbara BURKE is vice president and associate principal of Miss BURKE’s School.

Mrs. BURKE is now eighty-nine years of age, active, vigorous, still keenly interested in affairs and current events, and she now holds the important and essential position of supervising teacher upon the faculty of her daughter’s school.

Of the other members of the KENNEDY family Patrick J. KENNEDY was a stock broker both in San Francisco and Virginia City and a well known notary public in San Francisco for many years before his death.  He married Jennie CORDIEL, daughter of a Philadelphia family.  Their children were: Thomas F. KENNEDY, now representing American interests in Mexico; Eugene P. and Leo K. KENNEDY, mining engineers.  Mrs. Robert A. KINZIE and Gerald KENNEDY, who is connected with the Farmers Loan Bank.

Kate KENNEDY became a noted educator, and through her suit with the Board of Education of San Francisco for the tenure of her position as principal of the North Cosmopolitan Grammar School, she secured the rendering of the famous “Kate KENNEDY Decision,” which gives the California school teachers a stronger hold on their positions than those of any other state in the Union.  The Kate KENNEDY Club, an organization of teachers, and the Kate KENNEDY School are named after her.

Anne KENNEDY, another daughter, married John M. CUSHING, a pioneer who came from  Massachusetts to San Francisco.  Their sons, Oscar Kennedy CUSHING and Charles S. CUSHING, are engaged in law practice in San Francisco under the firm name of CUSHING and CUSHING.  Both of these men have risen to the highest eminence in their chosen profession.  Mrs.  CUSHING’s daughter, Caroline, is the wife of Prof. Clyde A. DUNIWAY, president of the University of Colorado Springs, but at the present writing, during his sabbatical year, is head of the Students’ Union in London, England.

Mary KENNEDY married Peter GAUGHRAN, an accountant, and spent the long years of her widowhood in California.

Alice KENNEDY married James LYNCH, a pioneer who came to California with STEVENSON’s regiment in 1846.  The details of early life in California may be found elsewhere in this work.  Their children were: James K. LYNCH, for years with the First National Bank of San Francisco, and later the first governor of the Federal Reserve Bank there; Francis W. LYNCH, who has been in the U.S. Customs Service in San Francisco for many years; Mrs. Thomas KAVANAUGH; Henry W. LYNCH, who is in the cattle business in San Luis Obispo County; Alice LYNCH, who is in the postal service in San Francisco; and Mrs. Archie SMITH of San Luis Obispo County.

Delia KENNEDY married James MOFFITT, a pioneer printer, who later became a member of the firm of BLAKE, MOFFITT & TOWNE, paper merchants.  Her sons are James Kennedy MOFFITT, banker, and a regent of the University of California, and Dr. Herbert C. MOFFITT, the eminent physician.  Mrs. MOFFITT’s daughters are Lucy, Mrs. John Hampton LYNCH of New York, and Alice, the late Mrs. George DOUBLEDAY of New York.

Of the original KENNEDY family two survive, Mrs. Delia MOFFITT of Piedmont, Oakland, and Mrs. Lizzie KENNEDY BURKE.

WILLIAM FRANCIS BURKE

William Francis BURKE.  When the late William Francis BURKE reached San Francisco, a lad of sixteen years, at the beginning of the ‘60’s, the city presented to his eyes a very different aspect from that which greets the eyes of the traveler today.  The day of his arrival he witnessed the hanging, on the public square, of a man by an infuriated mob.  In spite of this startling occurrence, and the lack of present-day improvements to him, as to the majority who came West in those days, it was a marvel, and certainly its scenic beauties were as wonderful.

William Francis BURKE was an Irish lad who had come to California by way of the long and arduous Panama route, which included the overland trip across the isthmus, for the canal had not only been built, but the French disastrous attempt had not been begun.  His boyhood had been  spent at Dublin so he was used to city life, but San Francisco was entirely different from anything he had ever experienced.  However, with the remarkable adaptability of his race, he soon became accustomed to his new environment, and secured work, and as soon as he had accumulated a little money went into business for himself as a shoe merchant.  Subsequently he was connected with the San Francisco Clearing House.  Earlier in life he became a charter member of the old City Guard, a famous organization of his time.

The death of this excellent man and good citizen occurred June 29, 1903, and he passed away, as he had lived, a devout member of the Roman Catholic faith.  He was an ardent republican in his political belief.  Mr.  BURKE also owned and operated a valuable farming property near St.  Helena, Napa County, and was a man of numerous interests, and was at all times deeply interested in the progress of his adopted city.  In 1866 he married Miss Lizzie KENNEDY.