Tulare County Biographies

Alvin B. Shippey

Transcribed by: Craig A Hahn

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

 
     In and around Visalia stand many monuments to the enterprise and good taste 
of Alvin B. Shippey, architect, contractor and builder. Mr. Shippey is a native 
of the capital city of Tulare county and was born March 28, 1874, a son of 
Daniel P. and Martha A. M. (Hurt) Shippey, both of Missouri birth who came to 
Visalia in 1872. 
 
     A carpenter by trade, Daniel P. Shippey operated a planing mill and worked 
at his trade in Visalia and has long been well known in connection with 
contracting and building interests in this city. Here some of his children were 
born and all of them grew up and were educated. The eldest is Mrs. Eva Sanders. 
The others are Mrs. Lela White, Walter of Porterville, Wilbur of Utah, Albert of 
Los Angeles, and Alvin B. of Visalia. 
 
     After his graduation from the public schools of Visalia, Alvin B. Shippey 
learned the carpenter�s trade under his father�s instruction; in fact, he began 
to learn it long before he left school, for he has driven nails since he was 
thirteen years old. He began his business career as a partner with his father 
and brother in the Shippey planing mill at Visalia, and in 1902 branched out for 
himself as a contractor and builder, making a specialty of doing architectural 
work and drawing plans for his buildings. The following products of his artistic 
handicraft should be mentioned here as a part of the record of his busy life to 
date: The James Crowley home, a house for John Frans, the Co-operative Creamery 
building, the homes of L. Scott, J. B. Simpson, John Daly, O. P. Swanson and L. 
Lucier, the North Methodist church, the new cannery building, the Palace stables 
and the residence of J. T. Akers; also twelve fine residences in Lindsay, the 
ranch house and barns of E. O. Miller, the Fred Hamilton residence, the Prairie 
Center school house and the residence of Louis Felder. 
 
     In 1902 Mr. Shippey married Miss Ethel Hamilton, a native daughter of 
California, whose father, J. Hamilton, was an early settler in the state, and 
they have two children, Chester and Mervyn. 
 
SOURCE:  History of Tulare and Kings Counties, California with Biographical 
Sketches - Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company, 1913, Pp 498, 499