Fresno County, 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


FRANK LANSE. � Three miles west of Parlier lies the well-improved 
sixty-acre ranch owned by Frank Lanse, an experienced viticulturist and 
orchardist. Mr. Lanse is a naturalized German-American, who is thoroughly 
loyal to the land of his adoption, and justly popular among his friends and 
neighbors. A native of the Prussian province of Westphalia, he was born at 
Hoexter, a city of about 8,000 inhabitants, September 3, 1865. His father 
Henry, was a respected, well-to-do German landowner. His mother was in 
maidenhood, Bernice Steinemann. 

There were seven children in the parental family, of whom Frank for 
Franz, the name given him in the Catholic Church at his baptism) is the eld- 
est. The others are : Anton, or Tony, now residing on his father's home place 
in Germany; Teressa, the wife of Anton Eicholdt, a carpenter at Fresno; 
Marie, the wife of A. G. Winter, a rancher in the Selma district; Henry, 
whose sketch is given elsewhere in this work ; Berthold, residing in Germany ; 
and Joseph, or Joe, a rancher living about a mile east of Frank's home place. 
In 1906 the parents journeyed from the old country to California to visit their 
children, and the mother was taken with pneumonia, dying about Christmas 
time, 1906. at San Francisco. The father remained in California until 1908, 
when he returned to Germany. 

Young Frank grew up on his father's Westphalian farm of 120 acres, 
attended the common schools of his native country eight years, and was 
afterwards a student of agriculture in the Agricultural College at Holzmin- 
den, Germany, for two years. The first of his family to emigrate to the 
United States, he took "French leave" of the Fatherland after six months' 
unwilling military service, never again to return as long as German mili- 
tarism is in the ascendency. After an uneventful and pleasant voyage, he 
landed at New York and spent one day in the metropolis before taking the 
Southern Pacific System, via New Orleans, for California. He arrived in 
San Jose, Cal., October 28, 1887. and, aside from his cousin. Albert H. Nig- 
gemain of that city, had neither friend nor relative in America. For three 
years he was employed in the butcher business in San Jose, and afterwards 
spent two years working in the plastering and cement business. 

In 1892 he came to Fresno County, and for three years worked on Eg- 
ger's 700-acre vineyard and about two sections of grain land, where he 
rose to the position of foreman. He then rented a ranch at Fowler, and 
after batching one year was united in marriage with Miss Winter, daughter 
of Gottlieb and Katerine (Karle) Winter, all natives of Russia. When fifteen 
years of age Mrs. Lanse had the misfortune to lose her mother who died while 
her daughter was quite a distance from home. When seventeen years old she 
came to California from her native country, her father, step-mother, three 
brothers, two half-sisters and two half-brothers having- preceded her and 
settled on a ranch which they purchased at Del Rey. 

In 1900, Mr. Lanse purchased twenty acres of land in Section 22, the 
nucleus of his home place, fifteen acres of which was planted to vines and 
peaches, ten acres of it being about equally set to Thompson Seedless and 
Sultanas, and five acres set to two-year-old peach trees. In 1911 he added to 
his acreage by the purchase of forty acres in Section 21, lying across the 
road west of the home place, twenty-eight acres being set to muscats, two 
acres to Zinfandels, eight acres to peaches and two acres to alfalfa. He is 
under the Consolidated Ditch Company's canals and can irrigate every foot 
of his land. However, with characteristic preparedness for every emergency, 
he has installed a pumping-plant (fifteen-horsepower distillate engine and 
five-inch centrifugal pump) for use in an exceptional dry spell. 

Mr. and Mrs. Lanse have an interesting family of five children: Kather- 
ine, or Kate, is the wife of Henry Wirt, a rancher at Del Rey, and the mother 
of a daughter, Dorthea E. Frank is a freshman in the Selma high school, 
and his father has provided a Chevrolet car for his special use in going to 
and from school. Joseph L. and Bernice T. are students in the grammar 
school, arid Gertrude M. is the youngest. 

Mr. Lanse is a close observer and student of economic conditions in 
Fresno County, and a strong supporter of the Raisin and Peach Associations. 
In his party affiliations he is a Democrat and supports the administration 
loyally. He lives in and belongs to the Fruitvale school district. Mrs. Lanse 
is a member of the German Lutheran Church at Fresno.