YUBA  COUNTY

 Biographies

ALBERT HAMILTON ARMSTEAD

A rancher who has made a specialty of orcharding, with enviable results, is Albert Hamilton Armstead, of Wheatland, in which place he was born on June 14, 1875, the son of William Oakley and Mary A. (Noe) Armstead.  William O. Armstead was born near Lake Champlain, N.Y., on November 26, 1826, of old Knickerbocker stock.  The ancestors came from Holland to New York and spelled the name Armistead until the time of the grandfather, when the “i” was dropped and the name became Armstead.  On the maternal side, Mr. Armstead is of French descent.  His grandfather, Jonathan C. Noe, was born in New Jersey.  He emigrated to Ohio, where he carved out a farm from the woods.

William O. Armstead taught school until 1849, and then, when twenty-three years of age, came to California as an Argonaut of that famous year, arriving at Greenhorn, on Bear River, in September, 1849, after braving the dangers of crossing the plains with oxen.  He mined for about three years, and then went to Santa Cruz and worked in the big woods.  He then returned, and with his Uncle Amasa Oakley took up a ranch and ran it in connection with a lumber and feed business in Grass Valley.  In 1871, he sold his share to his uncle, and went East again.  On June 20, 1872, he was married in Ohio.  Then he returned to California and was interested in a lumber yard in Wheatland with Hiram Carr; and in 1874 he bought the present place of 160 acres, adjoining the town.  This he farmed until his death, which came on January 19, 1905.  Mrs. Armstead, now well advanced in years, is still living.  She is the mother of five children, one of whom has passed to the great Beyond.

Albert Hamilton Armstead was the second in order of birth in his parents’ family.  He attended the public schools of Wheatland, and then began to work on the home ranch; and on their father’s death, the boys took charge.  Now he has 100 acres planted to peaches, and has become a successful horticulturist.  He has been chairman of the town board of trustees for the past sixteen years, and has been school trustee for twenty-two years.  He is naturally deeply interested in the locality in which he lives and prospers, and has a genuine desire to do what he can for the welfare of Yuba County.  In politics he is a Republican.

On August 16, 1906, at Oakland, Mr. Armstead was married to Miss Kathryn E. Hopkins, who was born at Greenville, Mercer County, Pa., but was reared in Oakland, and was a playmate of his childhood.  She is a daughter of Darius Adams Hopkins, a native of Farmersville, N.Y., who was a descendant of John and John Quincy Adams, Presidents of the United States.  Darius Adams Hopkins came to Austin, Nev., where he followed mining and afterward building; and there he was married to Mary Emelia Durst, born in Pennsylvania, who came to Nevada and was engaged in teaching until her marriage.  She made a visit to her parents in Pennsylvania, and there her daughter Kathryn was born.  The family came to Wheatland in 1884, and in 1890 removed to Oakland, where Mr. Hopkins engaged in merchandising.  The mother passed away in 1891; while the father spent his last days with Mr. and Mrs. Armstead, passing away in 1908.  Mrs. Armstead is the youngest of their three children.  She was educated in Oakland High School; and after her graduation she enter the Silver Street Normal Kindergarten Training School, from which she was also graduated.  She then became bookkeeper for a large mercantile house in Oakland, where she was engaged until her marriage.

The fortunate union of Mr. and Mrs. Armstead has been blessed with the birth of two children, Madelyn H. and Annette Katharina Armstead.  Mr. Armstead is a member and past president of the Native Sons of the Golden West, a Past Grand in the Odd Fellows Lodge, and a member of the Modern Woodmen of America; and with his wife he is a member of the Rebekahs, in which Mrs. Armstead in Noble Grand.  She is a member of the Civic Club and also of the Wednesday Club, of which she is an ex-president.  Having grown up in the community with which he is now prominently connected, Mr. Armstead has seen many changes for the better; he has great faith in the future of Wheatland, and believes that it will hold its own in the fast advancing development of Superior California.

History of Yuba and Sutter Counties, Historic Record Company, Los Angeles, 1924

p 617

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