San Joaquin County Biographies


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



 
HARVEY SMITH CLARK.
 
        In the long years since Harvey S. Clark came to California, he has taken 
an active and helpful interest in the development of the central section of the 
state, being numbered among the prominent and influential citizens of the Lodi 
section of San Joaquin County. He was born at Janesville, Wis., May 8, 1869, a 
son of Harvey Spencer and Mary (Smith) Clark, both natives of Michigan. The 
maternal grandfather Smith was a frontiersman in the lumber region of Michigan, 
and the father, Harvey Spencer Clark, was born and reared there. When he was 
married to Miss Mary Smith, he moved to Wisconsin, where he worked at his trade 
as a printer; later he moved his family to Detroit, Mich., and worked at his 
trade there. In 1875 the father came to California, and a year later was 
followed by his family. He engaged in farming in the vicinity of Lodi; later he 
was appointed postmaster of Lodi, and served in that capacity for sixteen years. 
There were three children in the family: Luella, Mrs. Burkholder; Harvey S., of 
this sketch; and Wallace, who died in October, 1922, all of Lodi. The father 
passed away at the age of seventy-eight years, while the mother is still living 
at 315 East Pine Street, Lodi.
        The father purchased a quarter-section of land in the Elliott district, 
two and a half miles northeast of the Elliott schoolhouse, and Harvey S. 
attended this school for three years; after the family removed to Lodi he 
attended the Lodi grammar school. Three years were spent in learning the 
printing trade with the Lodi Sentinel. Then he became a journeyman printer and 
worked at Woodland and Sacramento, afterwards coming to Stockton and working two 
years on the Stockton Independent. On account of his father's failing health, he 
then returned to Lodi and assisted his father in the postoffice. He was 
appointed postmaster several years before his father's death, and served for 
thirteen years, during which time the city and rural delivery system was 
inaugurated. When a change came in administration he was succeeded by a 
Democratic postmaster. Mr. Clark was then elected to the office of city clerk, 
and served for seven years, resigning this position on February 1, 1921, to 
devote his entire time to his ranch, southeast of Lodi on Wyandotte Avenue, 
consisting of thirty-five acres planted to vineyard of the Tokay, Alicante and 
Cornichon varieties of grapes, with some fruit and alfalfa. He has a fine and 
complete irrigation system, consisting of one five-inch and one three-inch pump, 
driven by a twelve-horse-power and a seven�and-a-half-horse-power engine, 
respectively.
        The marriage of M. Clark occurred on June 25, 1916, in Sonora, Cal , 
where he was united in marriage with Mrs. Minnie I. Murray (nee Chaney), born 
and reared in Des Moines, Iowa. Mrs. Clark has one son, Paul Murray, a graduate 
of Stanford University, class of 1922, where he majored in geology. Mr. Clark is 
a Republican in politics, and is prominent fraternally, being a member of the 
Masons, a past chancellor of the Knights of Pythias, and a member of the Modern 
Woodmen, of Lodi.
 
History of San Joaquin County, California � Los Angeles, Historic Record Co., 
1923
p   912       
Transcribed by Kathy Sedler.