Sacramento Valley Biographies

HENRY LESLIE BUTTON

Transcribed by Sally Kaleta, June 2009.

This file is part of the California Genealogy & History Archives http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cagha/index.htm



           Henry Leslie Button, a successful farmer of Yolo county, and a
citizen well and favorably known through his association with the interests
of the Democratic party, was born in Barren county, Ky., near Glasgow, July
31, 1851. His father, Alfred Button, was born in the same state May 28,
1817, a son of John Button, a native of Virginia, who located in Kentucky in
an early day and engaged in farming. Alfred Button was reared on a farm and
in young manhood married Martha Tudor, who was born near Summer Shade,
Metcalfe county, Ky., a daughter of Henry Tudor, a farmer of English
descent. She died in February, 1902, leaving a family of six sons and four
daughters, of whom six sons and two daughters are now living, Henry Leslie
Button being the only one in California. He came to this state in 1876,
after receiving his education in the common schools in the vicinity of his
home, and farming for himself after attaining his majority. He located first
in San Luis Obispo, where he worked out on a farm, on the 18th of March,
1878, coming to Yolo county. For two years he earned his livelihood by
working out on ranches in this section, but in 1880 purchased an outfit
consisting of a team of eight mules and rented three hundred and twenty
acres and began farming on his own account. He gradually increased his
acreage until he leased as much as sixteen hundred acres, upon which he
raised grain. For the last fourteen years he has been located on the old
McClurg place and also owns three hundred and twenty acres near Ely station,
which is devoted to grain. Besides his other interests he conducts a dairy,
being a stockholder in the Woodland Creamery Company. His ranch is equipped
with labor-saving machinery, among other late patents having a Haines-Houser
combined thresher, operated by thirty-two mules, and also runs three and
four eight-mule teams in carrying on his work.

           In Buckeye, Cal., Mr. Button was united in marriage with
Sophronia Ely, a native of Missouri, and a daughter of Benjamin Ely, an
early settler of this section, whose sketch appears elsewhere in this
volume. They became the parents of the following children: Robert,
Elizabeth, Leslie and Alice. Mr. Button was made a Mason in Kentucky and now
affiliates with the lodge in Winters. He is also a member of the Odd
Fellow's lodge and  encampment of Woodland. His wife is a member of the
Christian Church at Winters. Politically Mr. Button is a stanch adherent of
the principles advocated in the platform of the Democratic party and takes
an active interest in its advancement. 

"History of the State of California and Biographical Record of the
Sacramento Valley, Cal.," J. M. Guinn, The Chapman Publishing Company,
Chicago, 1906, Pages 533-534.