Sutter County
Biographies
FRANK H. BRUCE
The name of Frank H. Bruce is well and favorably known among the citizens of Yuba City, where until 1919 he had conducted a grocery business. Since that time he has been engaged in the development of his sixteen-acre orchard in the Lincoln district, where he now makes his home. He was born five miles north of Marysville, on September 17, 1881, a son of Eugene H. and Mary Ellen (Miner) Bruce. Eugene H. Bruce was the eldest of nine children born to J. H. and Annie M. (Binninger) Bruce, natives of Kentucky and Germany respectively, both now deceased. Grandfather Bruce came to California in 1848 and was the proprietor of the Ten-Mile House on La Porte Road. He passed away at the age of sixty-seven; and his two sons, Benjamin and Oscar, continued the business. Later the two brothers sold out and engaged in raising wheat and barley. Eugene H. Bruce conducted a livery and feed business in Marysville. He passed away at his home in that city.
Frank H. Bruce became an apprentice to learn the carpenter trade with the Yuba Construction Company, with whom he worked for twelve years, the last two years serving as foreman of the company. In 1912 Mr. Bruce made a trip to Alaska, where he spent one year.
The marriage of Mr. Bruce united him with Miss Effie M. Wallace, born at Scott’s Valley, Siskiyou County; and they are the parents of three children, Roberta, Robert, and Wallace. In 1913, Mr. Bruce suffered a painful injury which necessitated his giving up his trade; and so, with the money he had laid up he purchased a small stock of groceries and opened a store at the corner of Plumas and Sutter Streets in Yuba City. Six months later he bought the property, and during the next five years the store was remodeled and enlarged. In 1919 he sold the business; and since that time he has erected a concrete storage building on the property, which has a frontage of thirty feet on Reeves Avenue and is 120 feet long. He also built the frame building fronting on Plumas, which is used for a vulcanizing shop. He owns the Bruce Apartment House, located next to the concrete store building on Reeves Avenue, and his now erecting on Plumas Avenue a frame building 28 by 90 feet, which will be used for a pool hall. Mr. Bruce is a member of the Knights of Pythias and belongs to the D. O. K. K. in Sacramento.
History of Yuba and Sutter Counties, Historic Record Company, Los Angeles, 1924
p. 1123
MICHAEL JAMES McNAMARA
There is no phase in Sutter County’s early development with which Michael McNamara is not familiar and his reminiscences of the early days are most interesting, presenting a clear picture of life in this section when this was a frontier region. His birth occurred at Lakeport, Ill., November 20, 1841, the second in a family of five children born to John and Mary (Norton) McNamara. In 1853 the family started across the plains to California with a covered wagon drawn by two yoke of oxen and one yoke of cows; then they had two other wagons drawn by ten horses and one mule, and on September 15, 1853, they arrived at Sacramento. John McNamara and his sons did grading work on K and J Streets after the flood of 1852-1853 at four dollars per day, and for one year they were thus employed. In 1854 the family removed to Sutter County where John McNamara took up 640 acres on Feather River, which has been the family home ever since. He and his wife died here in 1896 and 1897.
On September 3, 1872, at Nicolaus, Mr. McNamara was married to Miss Catherine Claquez, born in Poughkeepsie, N. Y., a daughter of Philip and Caroline (Harris) Claquez; natives of Spain and New Orleans, respectively. Philip Claquez was a furniture manufacturer in Poughkeepsie, N. Y., but died when Catherine was four years old. The next year the mother brought her family via Panama to San Francisco in 1857, and thence came to Sacramento. There she met and married C. P. O’Neil, a pioneer whose portrait is now exhibited in Sutter Fort. The mother died in 1864 and Catherine came to Nicolaus and it was here she made the acquaintance of Mr. McNamara whom she married. Mr. and Mrs. McNamara are the parents of six children: Henry resides at Nicolaus; John resides at Lincoln; Michael F. is a rancher at Dixon; Philip resides at Galt; Carolyn is the wife of William Peckham and they reside at Wheatland; Anita is the wife of James A. Worth a rancher on the old McNamara ranch, whose sketch will be found in this volume. There are seven grandchildren in the family. On September 3, 1922, Mr. and Mrs. McNamara celebrated their golden anniversary at their old home which was attended by one hundred of their relatives and friends, some of whom had been present at their wedding fifty years ago.
History of Yuba and Sutter Counties, Historic Record Company, Los Angeles, 1924
p. 1127-1128