Yuba County Biographies

HENRY BLUE

Among Marysville’s loyal sons is numbered Henry Blue, who is a member of an old pioneer family of California and has spent his entire life in his native town, where he is widely and favorably known. He has had broad experience along business lines and is now connected with the Marysville Ice & Cold Storage Company, while he also takes an active part in civic affairs. He was born near Marysville on June 17, 1874, and his parents were James Franklin and Kate Blue, the former a native of Kentucky and the latter, of Germany. The father was reared on a plantation, and while still in his teens started across the plains for California, making the journey with ox-team and wagon. He arrived in San Francisco in 1849 and engaged in freighting from Marysville to the mines, subsequently becoming owner of the old Bithouse ranch nine miles north of Marysville in District No. 10, where his son Henry was born. The mother also came to California in early life. Both parents are now deceased. This worthy couple had nine children, seven boys and two girls; the boys are all living, but the girls are both deceased.

Henry Blue was the fifth in order of birth in his parents’ family. He attended the grammar and high schools of Marysville; and his initial experience along commercial lines was gained in the drug store of Flint & Crane. He remained with that firm for three years and then entered the employ of the P. C. Slattery Meat Company, with which he was identified for five years. For a considerable period thereafter he was connected with the Joseph Schoefer Grocery Store, and later acted as agent for the Union Ice Company. After the ice business was taken over by the Marysville Ice & Cold Storage Company, Mr. Blue joined the police force, of which he was a member for nine years, and then reentered the service of the ice company, with which he has since been associated. He has a thorough knowledge of the business, and his services are of value to the firm, for he discharges to the best of his ability the duties devolving upon him.

Mr. Blue married Miss Margaret Helena McDaniels, a native daughter of California and also a representative of one of the pioneer families of the State. Her parents were John and Nancy (Culbert) McDaniels, the former of whom operated the race-track at Marysville and died at the age of fifty-two years. He met a tragic death, being murdered on November 30, 1878, by a Chinaman who was in the act of robbing their residence when Mr. McDaniels surprised him. On November 13 of the following year the Oriental was hung for the crime. Mr. and Mrs. Blue have a son, Henry Franklin who married Miss Pearl Phelan, by whom he has a son, Robert Franklin. Some years ago, Mr. Blue built a comfortable bungalow at 417 Thirteenth Street, where he resides with his family. In his political views Mr. Blue is a Democrat; and in March, 1921, he was elected city councilman, being chosen for a term of four years. He is intensely interested in the civic life of Marysville, and is giving his time and best efforts to the city’s welfare. He is chairman of the Light and Power Committee, the Sanitary and Drainage Committee, and the Judiciary Committee. These three chairmanships keep him very busy. Mr. Blue originated and started the wild-game aviary on Ellis Lake, in Marysville, and has stocked it with wild geese and ducks of different breeds and with wild swans. To accomplish this, be obtained crippled birds from hunters who are his friends, placed them in his private pens and doctored them, and when they had recovered, transferred them to the lake. These beautiful wild birds, with their lovely plumage, are a rare and pleasing sight to the citizens and tourists, and his work in this direction is much appreciated and warmly commended. Mr. Blue finds recreation in fishing, hunting and baseball. His fraternal relations are with Marysville Lodge No. 783, B.P.O.E.; the Woodmen of the World; and Oriental Lodge No. 45, I..O.O.F.; and with his wife he is a member of the Rebekahs. Mr. Blue is a valued member of the Marysville Chamber of Commerce, and is serving on its board of directors. He is an active worker for the good of his community, and measures up to the highest standards of American manhood and citizenship.

A broad-minded, far-seeing man of affairs is Charles H. Powell, the enterprising proprietor of the Yuba Machine Works. He was born at Lenoir, Caldwell County, N.C., on April 8, 1878, the son of William Horace and May (Hartley) Powell. William H. Powell entered the Confederate Army as a private, serving under an uncle. After the war he became a manufacturer of lumber. Grandfather John Powell was a Baptist preacher, and was a Union man.

Charles H. Powell attended the local school during the winter months, and afterwards became a student in the Barnes high school; and what he missed of opportunity in early life he made up later in the school of practical experience. His first work was in a planing mill, next in a furniture factory, and after that in a cotton mill. He then apprenticed himself to learn the trade of a machinist, which he followed in the East after completing his apprenticeship. In 1898, when war was declared with Spain, Mr. Powell volunteered and joined Company D, 2^nd North Carolina Volunteer Infantry, serving at Port Royal Naval Station for six months, or until the close of the war, when he was honorably discharged. He at once reenlisted for service in the Filippino insurrection in Company E, 27^th U.S. Infantry. He came on to San Francisco, crossed the ocean in the small coast steamer Geo. E. Elder, and arrived in the Philippines in September, 1899. He took part in various engagements until the capture of Aguinaldo, and returned to San Francisco in March, 1901, being mustered out at the Presidio as quartermaster sergeant of Company E. Mr. Powell went back to his old home for a brief stay, after which he was drawn to the West again and located for a time in Albuquerque, N.M., where he was a machinist in the Santa Fe railroad shops for a year. Coming to California, he was employed by the Redwood Lumber Company at Pittsburg, and later operated a plumbing shop there until 1908, when he sold out to enter the service of the Alaska Packers’ Association. He made trips to Alaska in 1908 and 1909 as a machinist, the winters being spent in Oakland with an automobile machine works. In the fall of 1910 he located in Marysville, where he worked as a machinist for Dunning Bros. Company, until 1912, when he established his own business under the name of Yuba Machine Works. He is located on Third Street, where he conducts a general repair shop, doing all kinds of machine work, welding and cylinder-grinding. He employs six men and has a completely outfitted modern shop.

In Marysville, in 1912, Mr. Powell was united in marriage with Miss Myrtle Sears, a native of Oklahoma but a resident of Gridley, Butte County. Their union has been blessed with five children; Albert, Mary, Clinton, Jack and Gordon. Mr. Powell owns a comfortable home and he is a stockholder in the new hotel company. He belongs to the Knights of Pythias and the Woodmen of the World, and is a member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars. For recreation he is fond of hunting and fishing.