Mrs. Mary J. Fine
MRS. MARY J. FINE. What one woman of foresight and optimism, industry
and thrift may accomplish in the face of adversity and through the long years, especially
when fortunate in the fidelity, grit and co-operation of a gifted family, is happily
demonstrated in the life story of Mrs. Mary J. Fine, daughter of a well known
Stanislaus County pioneer, the widow of a very successful grain grower, and herself today
an extensive land owner and grain farmer. She was born at Merced Falls, the daughter
of William Grenfell, a native of England who was related to Sir Wilfred
Grenfell, who attained lasting fame in his relation to the history of Labrador and Canada.
William Grenfell was married at Empire City, Calif., to Miss Lucretia I. Ward. born in
Missouri, who crossed the plains with her parents in 1854 to Oregon and in 1855
they migrated to Stanislaus County. They had thirteen children; seven of these are
still living, and among them our subject was the oldest in the family.
| He came to
California in 1851 via Panama and settled on the San Joaquin River; he was a butcher
by trade, and in 1863 he removed to La Grange, where for ten years he ran a butcher
shop. Then he bought land and began farming in the La Grange precinct: and so
successful was he, through his agricultural knowledge, his own progressive methods,
that the 800 or more acres owned by Mrs. Fine were once part of his estate. |
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Mary Grenfell attended the public schools at La Grange, and in 1886 was
married to Louis Fine, a native of Little Rock, Ark., who had come to California in 1857,
when he was only three years old. The first ten years of his boyhood following were
spent at Stockton and "Tulare, and then he came to Stanislaus County and lived around
at various places on the East Side. Mrs. Fine had inherited a part of what she later
had in common with her husband, and together they bought another portion of the
estate. They engaged in grain farming, and raised cattle and horses and mules. Mr.
Fine passed away on September 11, 1915, with the honors and friendships of sixty-one
years of honest toil, the father of twelve children, nine of whom, with his widow, are
still living. Willis resides in Fresno. Clara became the wife of Zina Moodey, a
rancher situated two miles northeast of Modesto. Elmer L. is a rancher in the La
Grange precinct. Ellis David is assistant manager for the Pacific Gas and Electric
Company at Oakland. Royal A. resides at Stockton, where he works for the United
Motors Company; he served in France as an ambulance driver for two tears, and
while performing his humanitarian service, he was wounded. Loren A., an engraver,
is employed by the Sperry Flour Company at Stockton. Clinton R. is a well-driller,
and lives at Oakdale. Rhoda C. is the wife of Walter A. McCollum, carpenter for
the Merced Falls Lumber Mills. Oliver E. Fine lives at home and manages the farm.
Oliver was born on November 23, 1899, and attended the grammar schools at
La Grange. He finished the courses when he was sixteen ; and the next day after
graduation, although he was the youngest of the family, he assumed a man's
responsibility in undertaking to run the ranch, which was heavily in debt. He
worked hard and was fortunate from the first in his management, with the result that he was
able to pay off exert obligation and make a deal of money for both his mother and himself. In
addition to running the home ranch for his mother, he rents a section for his own
enterprise; he owns forty-eight head of horses and twenty head of cattle, has a
Deering combined nine-foot harvester and thresher, being the first man in this part of the
county to invest in such a machine. He is fitting it up with a fifteen-horsepower
gasoline engine, and he has 550 acres planted to wheat. barley and oats, a promising crop.
The success attained by all of her children testifies in no uncertain terms to both
the high moral character and exceptional intellectuality of Mrs. Fine, who is a devoted
member of the Episcopal Church and finds the most acceptable civic standards endorsed
by the Democratic party and its platforms. Her memory is remarkable, and she is able
to recall so much that is interesting and suggestive from the historic past that she is
never at a loss to entertain those interested in such topics. She remembers the La
Grange of the early '70s, when it could boast the most extensive gravel hydraulic
mining claims in Southern California, and the town had 500 population, three stores,
two hotels, three saloons, two blacksmith shops, one drug store, two physicians, an
express and post office, a public school, a church, a justice of the peace and constable,
and two lawyers. Oakdale was called Oak Dale, Knights Ferry was more properly
named Knight's Ferry, after a man known as Knight, who built the first ferry there,
and the changed boundary of the county line on the south was dubbed the "Merced
Grab." A city designed to be famous as Stanislaus City was laid out near the
steamboat landing at the junction of the Stanislaus with the San Joaquin River, but it grew
to have less than 100 inhabitants and then passed from the crude early maps. Tuolumne
City was another place which rose and fell. Salmon fishing used to be very good in
the Stanislaus, San Joaquin or Tuolumne rivers in early days, and when the water is
low, one can spear the fish with no difficulty.
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