San Bernardino County and Riverside County, California Biographies

History of San Bernardino and Riverside Counties 
By: John Brown, Jr., Editor for San Bernardino County 
And James Boyd, Editor for Riverside County 
With selected biography of actors and witnesses of the period 
of growth and achievement.
Volume III, the Western Historical Association, 1922, 
The Lewis Publishing Company, Chicago, ILL

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EDWIN J. GILBERT
  
           Coming to California over thirty years ago, Edwin J. Gilbert played no small 
part in the public and financial life of San Bernardino County, and to no man is the 
city and county more indebted for skillful and perfect handling of her public affairs . 
From his childhood he displayed an exceptional aptitude for finance, and he had a 
varied experience along various lines dealing with finances and figures, giving him 
an exceptional knowledge of values and finance. He passed away December 7, 
1921. He made a close study of his life work and his conservatism, with a mind like 
wax to receive impressions and like steel to retain them, his watchward was integrity 
and his work was not to be measured by figures. He was closely identified with the 
official life of the county, especially in finance and in assessments. He had progressive 
ideas and kept abreast of all the modern methods of handling and dealing with 
financial question and all lines of his offices, and he was gifted with practical foresight 
and an intuitive sense of values, combined with rare judgment. So it is no wonder 
that his fellow men, following his career, early learned that he  was the one man who 
would work for the good and the advancement of the commonwealth and demanded 
at the polls his election to various important offices. This appreciation of Mr. Gilbert 
was not confined to one circle of citizens, but it was a popular demand from all classes 
that he be placed in the offices. There were no loose ends about his offices, for he not 
only, knew how to do things himself but also how to get work done. Mr. Gilbert was 
born in Rockford, Illinois, June 18, 1848, the son of Milo and Margaret (Palmer) Gilbert , 
his father a native of Vermont and his mother of Cleveland, Ohio. Milo Gilbert moved 
to Illinois from Vermont about 1846, and located on a farm near Rockford. He did not 
confine his attention to farming, but did railroad contracting and was also a manufacturer 
and a merchant, and he achieved access in all lines. He was a representative and 
prominent man of that county. He came out to California in 1886 and located at Colton, 
where he lived, actively engaged in business and enjoying the Southland, until his 
death in Colton in 1906. His wife died in 1908. Mr. Gilbert was educated in the east, 
leaving Rockford with his father at the age of six years and locating in Charles City, 
Iowa. Here he attended school, and was graduated from the high school. He attended 
the Cedar Valley Seminary at Osage for two years. He then started to work, his first 
step on the road to success being employed by the C. M. & St. Paul Railroad, on the 
office force. Here he remained eight years, acquiring a thorough education in that line 
of work, and some knowledge of his work must have become known to outsiders, for 
he was then elected county treasurer of Floyd County, Iowa. This position he held for 
two terms and then decided to farm awhile. He farmed in Floyd County for four years 
and then went to Colton, California where his father had been located over two years. 
His first work in his new home was as a deputy for the county tax collector, and he 
followed this for eight years. Then he went into the assessor's office as chief deputy, 
and filled that position ably for two years. At this time he decided to go into business 
for himself, and accordingly opened offices in San Bernardino in 1909, making a 
specialty of public accounting, with that city as his headquarters.He was then, until 
1913, the state inheritance tax appraiser, and from 1913 to 1914, a portion or each year, 
was president of the board of Supervisors as county assessor, taking office the first 
Monday in January, 1915. He was, in fact, demanded by the people for the office, and 
he held that office until 1919 on that appointment, but in 1919 was elected for the four 
year term , and this position he held up to the time of his death, to the mutual benefit 
and satisfaction of all concerned. Mr. Gilbert was identified with financial circles of the 
city by a directorship in the American National Bank of San Bernardino. He married 
on May 4, 1870, Estelle Merrill, of Harmony, Maine, who died in May , 1914. They were 
the parents of three children: Lulu G., wife of Charles Miles, of Los Angeles, who has 
two children; Margery, wife of Dudley Strickland, of San Francisco, and who has three 
children; and Miss Florence, who was at home with her father. Mr. Gilbert was a 
member of San Bernardino Lodge No. 836, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, 
and was a member of the Modern Woodmen of America from 1886. In politics he was 
always independent.
 
Pages 1061 to 1062. 
Transcribed and submitted by Sally Kaleta, January 2010.