Tulare County
Biographies
ISAAC T. BELL
Isaac T. Bell, one of the business men of
Visalia, Tulare County, California, was born in Sumner County, Tennessee, July
17, 1844. His grandfather, Absalom Bell, emigrated from Scotland to this country
and settled in Maryland. To him and his wife three children were born, two sons
and one daughter. One of these sons, Tyree H. Bell, born in Tennessee in 1815,
is the father of Isaac T. He married Mary A. Walton, a native of Tennessee and a
relative of the distinguished Sir Isaac Walton of England. To them nine children
were born, seven of whom are living - all in California.
The subject of our sketch was educated in one of the primitive log schoolhouses
of old Tennessee, and remained on the farm until he was sixteen years old, when
he became a soldier on the Confederate side of the great civil war. He entered
the service as a private in Company F. Seventh Tennessee Cavalry, under General
W. H. Jackson, and afterward under General N. B. Forest. He was promoted to
aid-de-camp to General Tyree H. Bell, his father, and served in that capacity
till the close of the war. At the battle of Guntown, Mississippi, he was twice
wounded.
After the war Mr. Bell became a traveling salesman for a St. Louis firm, and
continued thus employed until 1868. About this time he was married to Miss
Elizabeth Smith, a native of his own State. He then engaged in the mercantile
business at Newbern and at Lexington until 1874, when he was elected Circuit
Clerk of the County of Henderson, and filled the office until 1878. From that
time until 1883 he was again employed as a salesman. In the latter year he came
to California, settled on the plains in Fresno County and engaged in farming. In
1886 he removed to Visalia and was clerk in the United States Land Office during
the administration of President Cleveland, his father being receiver during that
time. Mr. Bell is now a member of the firm of Jeffuds & Bell, and is doing an
extensive real-estate and land office business, both members of the firm being
experienced in their line of work and having extensive tracts of land for sale.
To Mr. and Mrs. Bell five children have been born, one of whom is deceased.
Those living are, James W., William J., John Tyree and Annie May.
Mr. Bell has been a member of the I.O.O.F. for twenty-four years, and has passed
all the chairs in the different branches of that order. He represented his lodge
fours years in Tennessee, and also represented the encampment in the Grand
Lodge. He and his wife are members of the Methodist Church South. He is a
steward in the church, and has been a superintendent of the Sunday-school for
fourteen years. By all who know him he is regarded as a useful, influential and
enterprising citizen.
SOURCE: Memorial and Biographical History of the counties of Fresno, Tulare and
Kern, California
Chicago, The Lewis Publishing Company, 1892, Page 637, 638 Transcribed by
Beverly Green
OZIAS BINGHAM
Ozias Bingham was born in New Hampshire,
February 6, 1832, and belongs to the sixth generation of the Bingham family born
in America. Thomas Bingham came to this country from Sheffield, England, about
the middle of the seventeenth century, and from him is descended the American
family of Bingham. Thearon Bingham, father of the subject of our sketch, was
born in New Hampshire. He married Almeda Gillow, a native of that State, and the
granddaughter of an Italian who joined his fortune in the Revolution, under
command of General La Fayette. They had six children, - five sons and one
daughter. One son died in infancy, and another, who came to California in 1852
with his brother Ozias, died in Westminster, Los Angeles County, in 1877.
Mr. Bingham is the fourth child of the family, and at the age of twenty he came
to this State with the intention of getting gold, returning East and obtaining a
thorough education. He mined in Yuba and Sierra counties, and was one of the
first to adopt hydraulic mining, and during his experience in the mines he
averaged about $10 per day in one claim, which was worked out in a few weeks. He
continued mining for about three years, and has since been engaged at it several
times, with varied success. He tried farming in Marin County, and remained there
five years; moved to Solano County and took up a homestead, and after erecting
buildings and making other improvements on it sold out and purchased land near
Vacaville, where he resided six years and sold again; located in San Jose, and
was for some time engaged in the real-estate business at that place; resided in
Stockton five years; removed to Modesto, and from there came to Tulare County in
1886. At first he purchased a place at Traver, where he lived until December,
1890, when he came to his present locality near Dinuba, and purchased a
twenty-acre raisin vineyard, which is now in bearing.
Mr. Bingham was married in California, in 1864, to Miss Josephine Williams, a
native of Iowa. She came to this State in 1853, and is a thorough pioneer in
every respect, having witnessed the wonderful development of this great
commonwealth. With her husband she has seen many of the hardships of life
incident to the early settlement of a new country, and with true pioneer bravery
they have met and overcome the many obstacles as they presented themselves, and
are now happy in the possession of a comfortable home in this sunny clime. Both
are members of the Presbyterian Church at Traver, and Mr. Bingham holds the
office of elder in the same. He is a member of the F. & A. M., having been made
such in 1858, and while at Vacaville was Master of the lodge. He was a charter
member of the A. O. U. W. at San Jose, and now belongs to the same lodge, No.
17. In politics he is a Republican; has held the office of Justice of the Peace
in Marin, Solano, and Tulare counties, and during ten years' service has never
had a decision reversed by the higher courts.
SOURCE: Memorial and Biographical History of the Counties of Fresno, Tulare and
Kern, California
Chicago, The Lewis Publishing Company, 1892, Page 611, 612 Transcribed by
Beverly Green