Tulare County Biographies

CHARLES F. STAYTON

Transcribed by Kathy Sedler

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

 
In San Joaquin county, Cal., Charles F. Stayton was born October 29, 1859, a son 
of John F. and Martha (Hawkins) Stayton, natives, respectively, of Missouri and 
Tennessee. His father, who had fought in the Mexican war, crossed the plains 
with ox-teams in 1852 from Independence, Mo., by way of Westport and old Fort 
Bridger, thence on by way of the Sublett cut-off and the sink of the Humboldt to 
Hangtown and Sacramento, the trip consuming between five and six months' time. 
Indians were a constant menace, but did the party little damage. After his 
arrival in California he began to buy stock, which he drove to the mining camps 
and sold. In 1869, five years after he had come to California, he went to Utah, 
where he mined till in 1887. Next he traveled to the White Mountains in New 
Mexico, where he was engaged in lumbering and mining. He died December 31, 1911, 
at the home of his daughter at Kingsburg while on a visit in California, aged 
eighty-seven.
In 1869, when his father left Tulare county, Charles F. Stayton was ten years 
old. In 1873 he went to herding sheep for John Tuohy, a pioneer in San Joaquin 
and Tulare counties, who owned at different times from five thousand to fifty 
thousand sheep. His favorite breed was the Spanish Merino, and he paid as high 
as $50 for single animals of pure blood and often sold rams for $50 each, ewes 
for $10 each. The thoroughbred sheep yielded an average of twelve pounds of wool 
to the fleece, and the others eight. After packing and herding for about eight 
years Mr. Stayton turned his attention to grain farming and after ten years of 
that he went into the stock business. After another ten years of success in that 
field he took up vine and fruit growing in Tulare county, buying twenty acres, 
fifteen of which is in Muscat grapes. He has a small family orchard started, and 
from four-year-old vines made a satisfactory crop of grapes in 1911, selling 
eighteen tons of raisins and three tons of other grapes. A private means of 
irrigation cheapens his production quite materially.
Politically Mr. Stayton affiliates with the Republican party and his active 
public spirit makes him very useful to the community. He married, near 
Porterville, Ella M. Mankins, a native of California, whose father was a pioneer 
here in 1852. Following are the names of their nine children: Lawrence, 
Clarence, C. Forest, Arthur, Mary, Belle, George Gordon and Ruby and Ruth 
(twins). Lawrence lives at Klamath Falls, Ore. All the others are residents of 
Tulare county. Arthur was accidentally killed by drowning in 1910.
 
History of Tulare and Kings Counties, California with Biographical Sketches - 
Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company, 1913, pp. 647