Ventura County
Biographies
Francis J. Beckwith
Francis J. Beckwith is one of the reliable ranchers of the section of the county where he resides. He was born in Ontario County, New York, August 14, 1834, of Scotch ancestry. His father, Nathan Beckwith, Jr., was born about the year 1798, resided in the State of New York for many years, and removed to Iowa, and from there back to Ontario County, New York, where he died at the age of sixty-five years. His grandfather, Nathan Beckwith, Sr., was a resident of Oswego County, New York, for many years, and an early settler there. Three of the Beckwiths were in the war of 1812. Mr. Beckwith's mother, Phebe (Granger) Beckwith, was born in Ontario County, New York, in 1808. She was the daughter of Elihu Granger, who came from New Jersey and settled in New York, where he resided for many years. Their ancestors had for a long time been residents of America. Mr. Beckwith was the youngest of a family of seven children, three of whom are now living. The family moved to Indiana when he was quite young, and he was reared on a farm and educated in the public schools of that State. Early in life he lost his father, and he remained on the farm with his mother until he was twenty-seven years old, and has made farming his life occupation. When Mr. Beckwith left home he removed to Michigan and purchased a farm near Vermontville, Eaton County, where he resided for two years in a log house of his own building - the only kind in which the early settlers lived. He sold out and worked in a mill for three years. In 1874 he came to California, and September 21 he came to his present ranch. He remained with his brother, Appleton Beckwith, who owned the ranch, for two years. Then he returned to Indiana, and two years later came back to California and worked for his brother nearly a year. February 3, 1881, Appleton Beckwith died, bequeathing his ranch to the subject of this sketch and another brother. This brother Mr. Beckwith has since bought out, and now owns the whole ranch, about 700 acres. Three hundred acres are farming lands, and the rest is pasture and waste land. The location of this property is in a beautiful farming country. Hogs and cattle were formerly the chief products of this district, but now the principal crop is corn and beans, twenty-five centals of corn to the acre and 2,000 pounds of Lima beans per acre being an average crop. Mr. Beckwith has made most of the improvements on the place. The grounds, with trees and flowers, everything about the house, the large barns and well-filled corn-cribs, all denote plenty and comfort. Twelve acres are in bearing English walnut trees, sixteen years old, and there is also a fine orchard containing a variety of fruit. The walnut grove yields at present $100 per acre.
In 1859 Mr. Beckwith married Miss Sarah Greenmayer, who was born in Ohio, July 5, 1841. Her father, Jesse Greenmayer, was a native of Pennsylvania, born in 1818, of Pennsylvania-Dutch ancestors. They have had a family of four children, all living. The two oldest were born in Indiana: Caroline M., September 20, 1860, now the wife of George A. Jones, and resides near Ventura; Charles F., January 12, 1862. Delbert T. was born in Michigan, January 31, 869, and Emma G. was born in California, October 22, 1878. Charles and Delbert are settled near their father, and Emma is at home with her parents. Mr. Beckwith's political views are Republican.
BIOGRAPHICAL HISTORY OF THE COUNTIES OF SANTA BARBARA, SAN LUIS OBISPO, AND VENTURA, CALIF. by Ida Addis Storke, 1891, p 313 Transcribed by Sandy Neder
A. W. Blumberg
A. W. Blumberg is the proprietor and manager of the Ojai Hot Springs, in the Matilija Canon, located fifteen miles from Ventura and five miles from Nordhoff. Here Mr. Blumberg has what might be called a village for the sick, the halt, and the invalid of every description, and here are located three springs. The Hot Sulphur Spring is 104° and is impregnated with sulphate of soda, magnesia and other healing properties, and is the safest and most healing to be found. Every one who has tried its efficiency speaks in the most emphatic manner of the benefits derived. Another fine spring is called the Fountain of Life, which is tonic in its effect. The third spring Mr. Blumberg calls the Mother Eve spring. It is alternative and cathartic in its effect. It is one of the unexplained mysteries of nature how these delightful health-giving fountains should flow from our beneficent mother earth in the same locality. The canon in which the little health town is located has a beautiful, clear mountain stream, the San Buenaventura River, running through it, filled with a great many shy little trout, that all can fish for but only the expert can catch. This romantic spot is hemmed in by mountains 1,000 feet high on either side, and those who enjoy wild and rugged scenery can here find a place of delight. It is about nine hundred feet above the sea, and is completely shut in from the breezes of the great Pacific, fifteen miles away. Mr. Blumberg has eighty acres of land, in the center of which he has built the Matilija House, which is designed with kitchen, dining-room, parlor and office, near which are five or six cottages in which guests may have the quiet of home. There are also some tents, the bath-house, a store and post office, all built and conducted by Mr. Blumberg, who is also the Postmaster. He is an enterprising business man, well informed, pleasing in his manner, and takes great pains to look after the comfort of his guests. Consequently, his resort is fast becoming a popular one.
The subject of this sketch was born in Roxbury, Delaware County, New York, July 9, 1836, the son of Christopher Blumberg. His grandfather, George Blumberg, came from Germany, was detained in the British army, and afterward became a settler of Delaware County, New York. Mr. Blumberg's mother, nee Jane Mackey, was a native of New York. Her father, Thomas Mackey, was also born in the same State. They were of Scotch ancestry. Mr. Blumberg received his education in New York, and afterward went to Iowa, where he was admitted to the bar. In 1872 he came to California, and after residing in Los Angeles one or two years came to Ventura County, where he has since remained. He built the first hotel in Nordhoff, for which he received the twenty acres of land on which it stands. He arrived in Nordhoff January 12, 1874, and at that time the town was in the embryo state. Mr. Blumberg named the hotel which he built The Nordhoff, but it has since been called the Ojai House. For three years he was its proprietor and conducted it successfully. The land for the town site was bought for $4.25 per acre, and sixteen years later Mr. Blumberg sold one-fourth of an acre for $5,000. He still has considerable real-estate interests in the town. He started the Hot Springs enterprise January 20, 1887.
Mr. Blumberg was married in 1859, to Miss Catherine E. Vancuren, a native of New York, daughter of Calvin Van Curen, also a native of New York. Their union has been blest with five children, four of whom are living, viz.: Ines O., Wheeler C., Birdsel W. and Irene M. The last named was the first child born in Nordhoff. Mr. Blumberg is a Republican and was elected Justice of the Peace by his party. He is a Master Mason.
BIOGRAPHICAL HISTORY OF THE COUNTIES OF SANTA BARBARA, SAN LUIS OBISPO, AND VENTURA, CALIF. by Ida Addis Storke, 1891, p 292 Transcribed by Sandy Neder