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


ISAAC DOSSEY MORRISON.� A well-known man in the develop- 
ment of the raisin industry, who has very naturally come to be a leader� 
partly through the inheritance of ability, and partly through his own develop- 
ment, by foresight and hard work � in helping to determine the agricultural 
future of the Golden State, is Isaac Dossey Morrison, the wide-awake and 
popular managing superintendent of the Kingsburg branch of the California 
Associated Raisin Company, the leading shipping-plant of the town. His 
father, the late Ezra D. Morrison, was a Kingsburg pioneer and one of the 
first successful raisin growers. He moved to the vicinity of Kingsburg with 
his family from Stockton in the fall of 1880, and at the time of his 'death, in 
1898, he was sixty-five years old. and was one of the honored pioneers of 
both Fresno County and the state, while he was pleasantly remembered in 
the East as a consistent and active member of the Cumberland Presbyterian 
Church. He owned an excellent ranch of 160 acres northeast of Kingsburg. 
forty acres of which were in vines, ten acres in orchard, thirty acres in alfalfa 
and the balance in grain. 

He was born at Portland, Me. He started for California in 1849, but 
stopped at numerous places for two or three years, and came across the 
Isthmus in company with his brother-in-law in the fall of 1852. They had to 
lie by at Panama for quite a while, waiting their turn to take a steamship to 
San Francisco, and so great was the rush of travel that they were offered a 
premium of $250 for their turn to embark, but they pressed on to San Fran- 
cisco, arriving there almost destitute, and Ezra Morrison traded his pocket- 
knife for his first meal. Then he went on to the gold diggings on the Ameri- 
can River and mined there ; and having struck success and made a stake, he 
returned to Stockton, where he engaged in grain-farming and stock-raising. 
He soon became a large operator, farming from 250 to 400 acres to wheat; 
and he helped build the Mariposa Road from Stockton via Collegeville to 
Escalon. Then he formed a partnership with Joseph Leighton, Isaac's uncle ; 
and they went to San Luis Obispo County and bought ten mares which were 
mustangs or Spanish ponies for breeding purposes, and bred these to stallions 
of the "Copper Bottom" breed and these were soon widely recognized as 
among the most successful breeders of that excellent strain. 

Ezra Morrison had married Miss Laura Anna Dossey. a native of In- 
diana, then of Dossey Meadows, a fertile section back in the mountains 
named after her father, James Dossey, who was one of California's pioneers, 
and one of the best-known of California sheepmen. He had moved from 
Indiana to Missouri, and from Missouri to New Orleans, La., where he em- 
barked for San Francisco by ship via Cape Horn, and arrived in the bay 
city in pioneer days. They had five children, among whom were Charles 
Yuba and Cynthia Eunice, twins, and Harold E. Morrison. An infant, Johnny, 
died in his third month. 

Isaac Dossey Morrison was born at Stockton, on November 6, 1874, 
and grew up on his father's extensive grain and stock ranch, where he went 
to work driving horses, plowing and handling horses while he was a mere 
boy. At fifteen he drove four and six horses on header wagons, and helped 
to harvest and thresh wheat and other grain. And with his parents he came 
to Kingsburg in 1880, finishing the grammar schools here. He early became 
interested in vineyards and raisin-growing, and now he owns and operates 
a fine raisin ranch near Kingsburg, in addition to his main employment at 
that city. 

He became actively interested in the welfare of the Raisin Growers at 
Kingsburg who organized several years ago, a company of farmers owning 
their plant; and he took charge as field man in 1916, and on April 19, 1918, 
became the managing superintendent of Plant No. 9 of the California Asso- 
ciated Raisin Company, when they took over the Kingsburg plant and busi- 
ness. The raisins are stemmed here and then shipped to Fresno, where they 
are processed and then put up in cartons for the market ; and so important 
has the industry become for the town and locality, that over 7,000 tons were 
handled at Kingsburg in 1918, while 1919's output is bound to show a large 
increase. 

Mr. Morrison was married to Miss Louisa Edith Paulson at Kingsburg 
on October 25, 1899; and now the well-mated couple reside in a beautiful 
home at the corner of A and Lewis Streets, where they dispense a heartv hos- 
pitality. They are both active members of, and attendants at the Methodist 
Episcopal Church, in which Mr. Morrison is the organist ; for his father's 
people were all musical and he inherited that gift to such an extent that he 
has become an accomplished violinist and organist. Four children share this 
church life with their parents : Pearl, Eunice, Hugh and Carroll. The latter 
was born the day before Christmas, 1917. 

Mr. Morrison is a Mason and a member of the Kingsburg Lodge, No. 
294, F. & A. M. In national politics, he is a Republican.