California Biographies

Transcribed by Peggy Hooper

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

Source:
History of the state of California and biographical record of the San Joaquin 
Valley, California. An historical story of the state's marvelous growth from 
its earliest settlement to the present time.
Prof. James Miller Guinn , A. M.
The Chapman Publishing Co., Chicago 1905
Notes: Missing Page: 865-866,983-984,1175-1176


JOHN DUNLAP COX. Looking back over his sixty-six years of life, John Dunlap Cox must 
needs find abundant cause for gratitude, not only because he has been endowed with sterling traits 
of a worthy ancestry, and a constitution which responded to the working of his active brain, but 
for the perseverance and determination which have enabled him to make the best of his oppor- 
tunities, resulting in such substantial assets as extensive land ownership in Stanislaus county, 
the comfort and inspiration of a family which reflects his example and ambition, and a good name 
and universal esteem which rewards his integrity and uprightness. Coming to the state a few 
months after attaining his majority, in the fall of 1859, ne found hundreds who sympathized with 
him in his effort at advancement, and who also were struggling to combine the climate and soil 
and glories of air and vegetation to their own and the state's perpetual good. The fifth of four 
sons and four daughters in a family dependent upon the resources of William Cox, and the ma- 
ternal guidance of Sarah (Dunlap) Cox, he was born in Colchester county, Nova Scotia, March 
22, 1838, his parents being natives of the same northern country. William Cox was a man of 
varied gifts, in early life making his living by teaching navigation and the studies in the com- 
mon schools, and later on devoting himself entirely to farming and stock-raising. 

John Dunlap came west on the steamer John L. Stevens, of pioneer fame, and upon arriving at 
his destination in the San Joaquin valley worked by the month on farms, first for Ben Holliday, 
and after a short trip to Oregon, entered the employ of Mr. Ovenheiser of San Joaquin county. 
For a time he drove cattle from Stockton to the mines, and from 1864 until 1870 owned and op- 
erated a ranch in connection with his freighting business. He then took up one hundred and sixty 
acres near Grayson, where he farmed for three years, removing then to Tulare county and en- 
gaging in the sheep business near Tipton for three years. Returning to Grayson in 1877, he 
bought his present home farm of two hundred and forty acres adjoining Grayson on the south, 
to which he has since added one hundred and sixty acres on the east, and seven hundred and 
sixty-four acres adjoining his first purchase, making in all eleven hundred and sixty-four acres in 
one neighborhood. He also owns a mountain ranch of five hundred acres, devoted chiefly to 
stock, and in connection with his home ranch leases and operates twenty-six hundred acres of 
the Patterson estate for wheat and barley. His enlightened methods and practical business 
sagacity have done much to elevate the grain raising industry in this section, and his career is 
yet another proof of what may be accomplished by sheer force of will power and wise disposal of 
advantages. In his grain-raising he is ably seconded by his stalwart son, W. W. Cox, who 
shares with him the use of the Patterson land and also assists him in the management of the home 
farm. Mr. Cox married Rebecca Curry, a native of Iowa, and besides William, the oldest of his 
children, there are four others: Sadie, Frank A., Mabel and John D., Jr. Mr. Cox cast his first 
presidential vote for the great emancipator, Abraham Lincoln, and has ever since espoused the 
cause of the party he represented. He is not an office seeker, but is a stanch supporter of his 
party, as he is of education, and the various upbuilding institutions which tend to the lasting 
good of the community.