California Biographies

Source: History of Fresno County, California, with biographical sketches of 
the leading men and women of the county who have been identified with 
its growth and development from the early days to the present (1919)

History By Paul E. Vandor 
Illustrated, Complete In Two Volumes 
Historic Record Company, Los Angeles, California, 1919
 
Notes: Missing+page1185-1186

Transcribed by Peggy Hooper

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


HENRY EDWARD ELAM.� A successful dairyman, who has won a 
reputation as a level-headed hustler, is Henry Edward Elam, the son of 
John H. Elam. He was born in Fresno, June 5. 1878, and came to Kerman 
when it first started. His father was a rancher, who later went into the 
blacksmith business in Fresno. He had a shop where the Farmers and Mer- 
chants Bank now stands. Then he removed to Coarsegold, Madera County, 
and there he continued as a smith until he retired. Now he resides with 
our subject. He had married Mary Lumsford. who was born in Kentucky, 
and died at Coarsegold in 1882, the mother of five children, among whom 
Henry E. was the third. Henry was brought up in Coarsegold until he was 
thirteen years old and attended the public school, after which he returned to 
the plains. He was employed for ten years on a grain-ranch in Merced 
County, where he learned to handle big teams with dexterity. For a couple 
of years, he was at Yreka. in Siskiyou County, and after twelve years' ab- 
sence, he came back to Fresno County. 

Mr. Elam then leased his uncle's dairy, twelve miles west of Fresno, 
and ran it for three years, and then he bought a ranch of sixty acres two 
miles west of Barstow where, with a fine herd of thirty-five cows, he con- 
tinued dairying for another three years. Then he sold out at a profit and 
removed to Fowler, and this time bought a ranch of fifty acres. It was 
devoted to alfalfa, so he established a dairy there, but after a year, he again 
leased land, this time at Barstow, where he also had a dairy. In 1917, Mr. 
Elam leased a ranch south of Kerman and conducted a dairy ; and in January, 
1919. he sold the lease and bought his present holding, a fine ranch of forty 
acres on Tensen Avenue, two miles southeast of Kerman. He checked it for 
alfalfa, arid once more opened an up-to-date dairy; for he found the country 
most admirably adapted to that field of husbandry. Then he joined the San 
Joaquin Valley Milk Producers Association. 

Mr. Elam was married, at Kerman, to Miss Viola Condon, a daughter 
of John Condon, whose life is also sketched in this work. Mrs. Elam is a native 
of Merced County and is held in high esteem. By a former marriage Mr. 
Elam has a son, Franklin Henry Elam. Mr. Elam is a Democrat, and a mem- 
ber of Fresno Parlor, No. 25, N. S. G W. : and both husband and wife attend 
the Methodist Church.