San Diego County Biographies

GEORGE W. FOX

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


banker, and one of the early settlers of Murrietta, was born in Zanesville, 
Ohio, January 24, 1842. His grandfather and great-grandfather were natives of 
Virginia. His father, Jesse Fox, was born in Wheeling, West Virginia, in 1803, 
and was married in that place to Miss Maria Begom, of Pennsylvania. They had 
four children, of whom the youngest, Mr. Fox, is the only survivor. He received 
his education in the public schools of Illinois and St. Louis, Missouri, and the 
Wyman High School, and took a course at Jones' Commercial College on leaving 
school in 1857. He moved with his parents to Kansas, then a Territory, where his 
parents died. In 1859 he crossed the plains, and while in Salt Lake City was 
employed as a clerk. At Camp Floyd was sutler's clerk with Albert Sydney 
Johnston's army. In 1861 he crossed the plains to Carson City, in charge of an 
ox train loaded with flour. He visited Sacramento and then returned to Virginia 
City, Nevada. From there he went to Humboldt County, where he was agent for 
Wells, Fargo & Co., and overland mail agent at Unionville, Nevada. In 1865 he 
resigned and went to Idaho, and from there to Montana, where he mined and was 
very successful. In 1869 he engaged in the banking business in Helena. Montana, 
and in 1872 organized the People's National Bank and became its cashier. The 
same year he organized the First National Bank of Roseman, of which he was the 
president. He continued successfully in the banking business until the fall of 
1877. In 1878 he removed to Tombstone, Arizona, and again became interested in 
mining. In 1879 he went to Old Mexico and returned to San Diego by way of San 
Francisco, where he was engaged in the newspaper business in 1881. In 1882 he 
went to Calico and became interested in mining again. He was one of the 
organizers of the Temecula Land and Water Company in 1884. He removed to 
Murrietta, where he has been engaged in real estate and banking ever since. He 
was made a Mason in 1870 and became an Odd Fellow in 1872; he is also a Knight 
Templar. He has held the office of school trustee, and has been prominent as a 
politician. He has seen a great deal of frontier life and is a thorough business 
man. He is the historian of the Murrietta Historical Society, and was a leader 
and influential in aiding in the construction of the new school-house. For some 
time he has used the Government instruments in taking the meteorological 
observations.
 
SOURCE:  An Illustrated History of Southern California:  Embracing the Counties 
of San Diego, San Bernardino, Los Angeles and Orange, and the Peninsula of Lower 
California� Chicago:  The Lewis Publishing Company, 1890.  p.-  296-297