Santa Barbara County Biographies

J. W. HENDRICKS

Submitted by Peggy Hooper

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


J. W. HENDRICKS, a farmer of Lompoc, was among the first settlers there. He was born in 
Dayton, Ohio, in 1823. His father. Aaron M. Hendricks, was by trade 'a carpenter, and 
a native of Tennessee. In 1812 he was at the battle of New Orleans as Sergeant, under 
General Jackson. In 1837 he emigrated to Indiana, where he followed his trade. The 
subject of this sketch lived at home until twenty-two years of age, and worked at farming. 
In 1846 he was married, at West Point, Tippecanoe County, to Miss Esther A. Wagner, a 
native of Ohio. Mr. Hendricks then rented a farm of about 150 acres and followed 
farming up to 1865, when he crossed the plains for California; P. W. Fondy was in 
command of the train, which was very large, and there was much sickness in the company. 
They were five months on the way, and came to California by Truckee. Mr. Hendricks then 
went to Marysville, where he bought 120 acres and farmed for four years, then going to 
Hollister, where he rented 600 acres, and carried on general farming up to the fall of 1874, 
when he came to Lompoc and bought sixty-eight acres where he now resides. Land was 
then covered with brush, and they could shoot wild-cats, deer and coyotes from the house. 
The land is now nicely cleared and under a high state of cultivation; mustard, beans and 
barley are now his chief crops, and he also raises a fine grade of horses. He has three 
children, all married. After many years of hardship Mr. Hendricks fully enjoys his present 
comfortable home. 

History of Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo and Ventura Counties, California  - by 
C.M. Gidney, Benjamin Brooks, Edwin M. Sheridan, Vol I, II.  -Lewis Publ. Co., 
Chicago, 1917.