Ventura County
Biographies
BURTON L. MUNGER, Sr.
Various members of the Munger family have been
actively identified with Ventura County for over forty years. As a family they
have helped forward the development work and especially diversified horticulture
of this region.
Dexter X. Munger, father of Burton L., was born in Genesee County, New York, in
1836, was reared and educated there, being a college man, and in 1857 remove
with this parents to Shiawasee county, Michigan. The father of Dexter was one of
the pioneer lumbermen of that region, and buying a large tract of timber land he
erected a planning mill an on his land established the Town of Mungerville. In
order to attract permanent residents he gave each settler an acre of ground.
Dexter Munger found employment in his father’s mill at Mungerville but in 1861
subordinated all personal interests to the welfare of his county, and enlisted
in the Ninth Michigan Cavalry. A portion of this regiment afterwards had the
distinction of capturing Jefferson Davis. Later he became captain of a company
and served until the close of the war in 1865. He then re-enlisted in the
Veteran Reserve Corps and was second in command at Fort Snelling, Minnesota,
during the Indian troubles on the northwestern frontier. In 1867 he returned to
Mungerville, Michigan, to take charge of his father’s estate. In 1869 he removed
to Tullahoma, Tennessee, and was a merchant there until he came out to
California in 1876. Locating at Nordhoff in Ventura County, he bought sixty-five
acres of land and set out the olive grove which now distinguishes that tract
under the name Los Olivas. He sold this olive grove in 1880 to his son, and
removed to Boston, Massachusetts, where he was actively identified with he
mercantile business for a number of years. In October 1889, having sold his
eastern interest he returned to California and while visiting his sons in Santa
Paula died in January, 1890. Dexter Munger was a republican and a member of the
Methodist church. He was married in Orleans County, New York, to Miss Jennie
Warren. They were the parents of two sons: Seymour of Nordhoff, California, and
Berton Lorenzo.
Berton Lorenzo Munger was born in Mungerville, Michigan, June 15, 1858. He had
the advantages of the public schools there until 1869, and afterward attended
school at Tullahoma, Tennessee, until he was seventeen. On coming to California
with his father he took up farming at Nordhoff in Ventura County, and in 1880,
as already stated, he and his brother Seymour bought their father’s olive grove.
In 1887 Berton Munger sold his interests in that property, and removed to San
Bernardino County and had charge of some lime works for six months. ON returning
to Santa Paula he put in three yeas with the Hardison-Steward Oil Company, and
then became manager of the Hardison Horse and Cattle Company a business which
engaged all his time and attention for twelve years. Some years ago Mr. Munger
bought fifty acres west of Santa Paula, and now has it developed, eight acres in
lemons, twenty-five acres in beans, and the rest in pasture.
Mr. Munger is affiliated with the Woodmen of the World, is a republican in
politics, and a member of the Presbyterian Church.
In the Ojai Valley of Ventura County in August, 1888, he married Miss Elizabeth
Gamble. They have four sturdy sons. Elwood is connected with the Union Oil
Company at Fullerton, California. The other three, Heathcoat, Berton L., Jr.,
and John, are all engaged in ranching in Ventura County. Mrs. Munger is a native
of Ireland and a daughter of John Gamble. She is the nice of John Pinkerton,
deceased, who was one of the first to buy land from Senator R. R. Bard in the
upper Ojai.
History of Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo
and Ventura Counties, California - by C.M. Gidney, Benjamin Brooks, Edwin
M. Sheridan, Vol I, II. -Lewis Publ. Co., Chicago, 1917.
Transcribed by Carolyn Feroben - pp 580-581
CHAUNCEY I. CRANE
represents the second generation of a family
of successful horticulturists and ranchers in Ventura County. He is a son of Mr.
J. L. Crane, whose business connections and whose experience during his active
career are detailed on other pages.
In Saticoy Ventura County, November 4, 1877, Chauncey I. Crane was born, and he
grew up on his father’s place and was a student in the public schools until he
reached the age of sixteen. After that he found regular employment on his
father’s ranch and in the varied business affairs controlled by his father up to
1896. leaving home, he then became a farmer for himself in Orange County, but in
1909 returned to Ventura County and took charge of his father’s fifty acre ranch
in the vicinity of Santa Paula. He has forty acres of this planted in walnut and
the rest is a lima bean plantation.
Chauncey I. Crane is a member of the native sons of California, of the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows, is a democratic voter and affiliated with the
Universalist Church. On March 15, 1900, he married in Los Angeles Miss Edna M.
McLean, a native of Missouri. They are the parents of two children: Elmer
Jefferson, fourteen years of age, is attending the public school, and Nellie May
is also a school girl.
History of Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo
and Ventura Counties, California - by C.M. Gidney, Benjamin Brooks, Edwin
M. Sheridan, Vol I, II. -Lewis Publ. Co., Chicago, 1917.
Transcribed by Carolyn Feroben - pp 554
JAMES T. O’CONNOR
When a man starts life as a hard worker and
struggling against adverse circumstances at an age when most boys are at school,
and finally masters the problems of live so as to gain the object of his
ambition for material success it is genuine admiration that people regard the
results of his enterprise and diligence.
One of the old time residents of Ventura County has had such a career. He is Mr.
James T. O’Connor, of Camarillo. Born in County Sligo, Ireland, February 2,
1862, a son of Thomas and Mary (Connel) O’Connor, he was brought to New York
City by his parents at he age of ten years. In that metropolis he had the
advantage of the public schools and the St. James parochial school until he was
fourteen. He then started out to make his own way in the world. The first six
months were spent as a laborer in a greenhouse in Springfield, New Jersey, a
similar period was spent in a greenhouse at Flatbush, Long Island, and he then
went to Newark, New Jersey, and was employed in a glue factory for two years.
Such was his early experience and environment. Coming west to Ventura County, he
here laid the real foundation of his business success. For three years he worked
on Mark McLaughlin’s ranch, and at the end of that time felt such a confidence
in his ability that he bought 320 acres from the Patterson Ranch Company and
started out as an independent farmer. He was successfully identified with the
management of that land until 1900, when he sold out and bought 200 acres
comprising the north-west corner of the noted Calleguas rancho near Camarillo.
This property he has developed intone of the very valuable estates of the
county. About thirty acres are planted in walnuts, and aside from that his chief
crop is lima beans.
Mr. O’Connor, who is married, is a member of the Catholic Church and in politics
is a democrat.
History of Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo
and Ventura Counties, California - by C.M. Gidney, Benjamin Brooks, Edwin
M. Sheridan, Vol I, II. -Lewis Publ. Co., Chicago, 1917.
Transcribed by Carolyn Feroben - pp 570