California Biographies, San Joaquin Valley

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


WILLIAM SWALL. As showing what may be accomplished by a young man who marks out a 
career for himself and resolutely goes to work to make his dream of success in life a reality, the 
career of William Swall of the Visalia district, affords a useful lesson to the youth of a later day. 
Mr. Swall, who is one of the large land owners and substantial and prominent men of his 
neighborhood, was born in La Salle county, Ill., November 5, 1848, and is a son of Mathias and 
Elizabeth (Hayne) Swall, both natives of Germany, the former born in Berlin January 24, 1824. 
The elder Swall came to the United States in a sailing vessel in 1840, locating in La Salle county, 
Ill., where his marriage occurred April 16, 1847, and where he continued to farm until 1865. 
Having become interested in the far west, he came to California by way of Panama in the 
summer of '65, spending the first winter on a farm near San Jose, and in the fall of 1866 locating 
on land near Tracy, San Joaquin county. In 1871 he sold his land and removed to Monterey 
county, engaging in dairying and stock-raising until 1877, in which year he moved to Ventura 
county, and from there to Sherman, Los Angeles county, in the fall of 1882. Mr. Swall continued 
to farm and run a dairy until shortly before his death, in May 1896, being survived by his wife, 
who still lives in Sherman. Mr. Swall was a stanch Democrat, and in religion was a member of 
the Roman Catholic Church. 

The oldest of two daughters and nine sons, William Swall was educated in the public schools of 
La Salle county, Ill., and Santa Clara county, Cal., finally attending the San Jose Institute for one 
term. ' He was well trained in all phases of farm work, to which he took naturally and with due 
appreciation of its many advantages, and in 1873 came to Tulare county and homesteaded 
eighty acres of land, later adding to his possessions' by buying land along the Tule river. In 1884 
he moved to his present place of eight hundred acres, known as Deep Creek ranch, which he 
has improved into one of the finest and most productive properties in the county, having one 
hundred and fifty acres under peaches, prunes and pears, and the balance under hay and 
grazing. His original place is known as the Tule River ranch, and in all he owns over twenty-five 
hundred acres of land, his extensive operations necessitating the renting of an additional 
thousand acres which he uses for stock and fruit. He has given splendid and intelligent effort to 
the development of his land, has embraced all of the means at the disposal of the latter-day 
agriculturist, and has reaped the reward due to so liberal minded and progressive a rancher. 
Mr. Swall has diverted his energies from the farm to the town and is a stockholder of the Bank 
of Tulare a director in the Tulare Telephone Company, and a stockholder and a director in the 
Rochdale stores of Visalia and Tulare. He has been one of the foremost promoters of irrigation 
in the county and was one of the original instigators of the Tulare Irrigation District. During the 
settlement in 1903 with the bondholders he was one of the directors of the irrigation district 
and continues in that capacity to the present tune. A Republican of many years standing, he has 
never been an office seeker, but has nevertheless served as a director of the Elk Bayou school 
district. 

In San Francisco, in 1869, Mr. Swall was united in marriage with Emma Cole, a native of Knox 
county, Ill., and daughter of Asa Cole, born in Ohio. Mr. Cole is a California pioneer of 1856, 
having crossed the plains with his family, locating in Contra Costa county. Removing to Santa 
Clara county several years later, he located in the fall of 1866 near Tracy, San Joaquin county, in 
1873 taking up his residence in Visalia, and in 1888 returning to Brentwood, Contra Costa 
county, where he died the same fall. Mr. and Mrs. Swall became the parents of the following 
children : George, a dairy rancher near Visalia ; Newell, deceased; Walter, a dairy rancher near 
Visalia; Arthur, a rancher five miles south of Visalia ; and William, Jr.. living near his father, five 
miles south of Visalia. Mr. Swall is described by his host of friends as a prince of good fellows, as 
a man always ready to lend a helping hand to those less fortunate than himself, and as one to 
whom the responsibilities of citizenship appeal with force and decisiveness. Of resolute and 
commanding character, he is noted for his fairness in all matters of business, for his leniency, 
kindness and good judgment, and for his loyalty to family, friends and general interests.