GOLD & LORE: The Reverend William S. Kidder (1834-1911)

The following is a brief biography of a great Shasta County pioneer.

The Reverend William Samuel Kidder was born on November 15, 1834 to John Kidder and Mary Ann (Payne) Kidder in Charing, Kent County, England. He is my paternal great-great-great grandfather and he was eight years old when his family emigrated from England to the United States in 1842. They settled at Pittsfield, Otsego County, New York. At the age of twenty-four William leaving his family, departed Pittsfield and ventured west to California. He eventually settled at French Gulch in 1858. In 1859 a school opened in Whiskeytown and he was hired as the teacher; this is where Kidder became affiliated with the Whiskey Creek Baptist Church. Kidder was ordained as a Baptist minister in Sacramento on September 9, 1860.

On August 2, 1861, Kidder was appointed Post Master at French Gulch. Between 1863 and 1873 (with the exception of his Civil War service) he was employed as a miner by the Washington Quartz Mining Company at the Washington mine in French Gulch, part of the French Gulch mining district. The Washington mine was the first gold mine in Shasta County having been located in 1852, by pioneers John Souter and John Syme. Syme was the superintendent at the mine when Kidder was employed there.

Kidder enlisted into the United States Army on November 10, 1864 from Marysville where he served as a soldier in the Civil War with Company I., of the Seventh California Infantry, fighting for the Union army. During the war, William’s unit was directed to Arizona where they were ordered to protect military forts. He was honorably discharged in March of 1866 at Presidia and eventually returned to French Gulch.

A year later on December 5, 1867, William Kidder was married to Mary Elizabeth McFarlin (1849-1938) by the Reverend S.N. Newkirk, in a double wedding ceremony with the bride’s sister, Martha Ann McFarlin, marrying Thomas Burton Smith at Eagle Creek (now Ono). It was Kidder who performed the Smith wedding that day. Mary was one of ten children born to George McFarlin and Martha Yelland (Miller) McFarlin, pioneers of Shasta County, who arrived at Texas Springs with their family in 1860 from District 24, Grant County, Wisconsin. They are my paternal great-great-great-great grandparents.

L-R: The Reverend William S. Kidder and his wife Mary E. (McFarlin) Kidder. From the collection of Jeremy M. Tuggle.

At the age of 35, William appears on the 1870 U.S. Census, living in French Gulch and working as a miner. His wife was listed at age 20, as a common house wife, and in the interim one child was added to the household. During the 1880s, Kidder petitioned for a homestead in the Eagle Creek area. The petition was granted and the family moved from French Gulch to Eagle Creek. This is where he began to farm, but he continued preaching and mining to support his family. The Reverend William S. Kidder was elected as the Shasta County Assessor in 1880 and he served through 1886.

In 1883, the people of Eagle Creek were getting tired of traveling five miles to the town of Igo to receive their mail. The residents met and submitted a petition for a new post office to the Postal Service headquarters at Washington D.C. The names that were offered on the petition were Eaglesville, Eagle Creek and Orofino (meaning fine gold in Spanish). The names Eaglesville and Eagle Creek were turned down by officials in Washington D.C., because they conflicted with names used elsewhere in California. The name Orofino was also rejected because there was a town in Siskiyou County with that name.

The petition was granted for a post office, however, the local residents were furious about the objections as new name would first have to be selected and approved in order to establish a post office. Local residents asked the Reverend William Samuel Kidder to suggest a name for this burgeoning farming and mining area. Kidder suggested the name Ono, he picked the name from the bible in Neahmiah 6:2 "as we meet together on the plains of Ono." The name Ono derives from a town in Jerusalem, formerly called Ono, now known as Auna. On April 16, 1883, a post office was established by the United States Postal Service called Ono. William appointed his brother-in-law William Miller McFarlin, to be the first Post Master of Ono.

Kidder founded numerous churches in northern California including the First Baptist Church of Red Bluff in 1860 and the First Baptist Church of Redding in 1887, becoming the first pastor at both churches. Kidder enjoyed God’s calling and traveled to different Baptist churches and schools in the area to preach the word of God. He preached at places with names like Copper City, Excelsior, Bald Hills, Gas Point, Kimball Plains, Pickney, Aiken Gulch, Watson Gulch, Millville and Eagle Creek (Ono). He performed many marriages throughout his lifetime. The Fellowship Hall of the First Baptist Church in Redding, was dedicated as Kidder Hall in April of 2007 in memory of Kidder by church officials.

In 1887, Kidder purchased the Tellurium Restaurant on Market Street in Redding. This restaurant was open at all hours of the day and it offered a good table setting at twenty-five cents a meal. Eventually moving his restaurant into a building on the corner of Market and Butte Streets in Redding, owned by John O. Welsh. On November 4, 1890, Thomas B. Smith was elected as Shasta County assessor and he appointed his brother-in-law, the Reverend Kidder to be his deputy assessor, a position in which Kidder had previous experience. Kidder acted as one of his deputy assessors until 1894.

The Reverend William S. Kidder died on March 16, 1911 at his home in Ono. He was 76 years old. The Reverend William S. Kidder and his wife had a total of eight children, which included seven daughters and one son. All of his children were educated at the Ono Schoolhouse. The pioneer Baptist minister was labeled as the “the most respected man in western Shasta County” by the Courier-Free Press newspaper of Redding, at the time of his death. There is simply not enough room to name all of Reverend Kidder’s accomplishments and achievements during his lifetime. Local historians, and his descendants, continue to chronicle his life story which can be found in numerous periodicals and books at the Shasta Historical Society and the Redding Library. His wife Mary Elizabeth (McFarlin) Kidder survived him and died in Redding on January 9, 1938. She was 88 years old. Both of them are buried at the Ono Cemetery in Ono. Many of their descendants still live in Shasta County, and like me, they are proud of their pioneer heritage.

(This article was written by Jeremy M. Tuggle.)

GOLD & LORE: William Albert Pryor made a mark as a pharmacist in Shasta

Before William Albert Pryor became an apothecary, there were only a few men who made their mark in Shasta's colorful history as a pharmacist. Pryor, sometimes referred to as 'Will,' was one of Shasta's most enterprising entrepreneurs, successful in his trade and very popular among the locals during his generation.

Pryor was born on June 16, 1853, in Calaveras County, California. According to the 1860 U.S. Census, Pryor was the second child of pioneers Joseph Pryor and Prescilla Thomas Pryor, who had four children — three boys and one girl. Joseph Pryor was a native of England who came to Shasta County in 1854 and purchased a piece of property at Huling Creek in western Shasta County, near the settlement of Eagle Creek, which became the town of Ono in 1883.

His father's occupation was listed as a miner. Their children's adventures kept them busy while they were growing up, as Shasta County offered lots of recreational activities, as well as the general education they needed to succeed in life.

Joseph Pryor sold their property sometime between 1859 and 1862 before moving to the town of Shasta. At age 21, he registered to vote on June 20, 1874, in Shasta and listed his occupation as a telegraph operator. William Pryor relocated to Sacramento, where he lived and worked as a store clerk for a very short time.

When he returned to Shasta County, William Pryor was hired as a bookkeeper for J.E. Church in Red Bluff. As he approached the age of 30, he won the heart and the affection of Josephine Litsch, a daughter of pioneers Charles Litsch and Julia Behrle Litsch. They were married on April 22, 1885 at the home of the bride's parents in Shasta.

William and Josephine Pryor had two daughters, Alice and Ethel. William Pryor purchased the Spatz & Litsch Bakery Saloon from his father-in-law, Charles Litsch, and he remodeled the interior of the building and turned it into a thriving pharmacy named the City Drug Store. Among other products, Pryor sold standard patented medicines at his store.

Professional druggists had their own drug prescription forms printed. Pryor had his printed on standard paper with his company logo. He sent them to various doctors in the area, and the doctors would fill out each form and sign their signature or mark on the bottom line. When a form was sent in to him by a doctor or the doctor's patient, Pryor would review the form and fill it accordingly to the directions given by the doctor.

The prescription forms would chronicle the patient's name, the name of the medicine and how to proceed with taking the medicine. Like today, consultation would be rendered by Pryor to each patient.

Between 1885 and 1889, Pryor served as a post master for the town of Shasta. At age 43, the 1896 Shasta County Great Register describes him as 5-foot-7, with light complexion, blue eyes and brown hair. His occupation was listed as a druggist.

Surprisingly, Pryor acquired a secondary job in 1903 working as a telephone agent in Shasta as he operated his pharmacy. Around 1905 or 1906, he closed the City Drug Store and moved his family to Sausalito, where he was hired by the Northwestern Railroad Co., leaving the apothecary trade for good.

In 1912, his family moved to the Claremount District of Oakland, where he took a leave of absence from the railroad company as William and Josephine were building their new home at that location. Only bits and pieces of information can be found on Pryor's life after 1912, but we do know that his wife died in 1918.

In 1920, Pryor was living in San Francisco as a widower. He died June 2, 1927, at the age of 74. During his lifetime, Pryor was a charter and active member of the Shasta Parlor No. 35, Native Sons of the Golden West and was a member of the Castle Lodge No. 62 Knights of Pythias in Red Bluff.

From the collection of Jeremy M. Tuggle

(This article was written by Jeremy M. Tuggle.)