Jacquelin Chatfield & James Mallon

FAMILY LINE AND HISTORY

Jacquelin(e) “Jacq” Chatfield
7th of 9 children of Clark Samuel Chatfield, Sr. & Mary Elizabeth Morrow
Born: Feb 3, 1886, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado
Died: Dec 7, 1964 (age 78), Oakland, Alameda Co., California; stroke
Buried: Dec 10, 1964, cremated, inurned in Graves Cemetery in Orland, Glenn Co., California
Avocation: Singer
Religion: Presbyterian/Episcopalian
Married: Nov 9, 1902, James Frederick “Jim/J.F.” Mallon, Basalt, Pitkin Co., Colorado
Four children: James DeVere “DeVere” Mallon, Marjorie Maxine Mallon, Neva Harriet Mallon, Leslie Mallon

James Frederick “Jim/J.F.” Mallon
1st of 12 children of George Washington Mallon & Mary Ann Thompson
Born: Nov 19, 1873, Salina, Saline Co., Kansas
Died: Apr 12, 1944 (age 70), near Orland, Glenn Co., California; heart ailment
Buried: Apr 15, 1944, in Graves Cemetery in Orland, Glenn Co., California
Occupation: Livestock owner; vice-president of California State Irrigation Association; in charge of building Hamilton City-Harrington railroad; developed first rice growing project in Colusa Co., California
Affiliation: Knights of Pythias
Religion: United Methodist/Presbyterian
Married: Nov 9, 1902, Jacquelin(e) “Jacq” Chatfield, Basalt, Pitkin Co., Colorado
Four children: James DeVere “DeVere” Mallon, Marjorie Maxine Mallon, Neva Harriet Mallon, Leslie Mallon

1. James DeVere “DeVere” Mallon
Born: Dec 5, 1904, Chinese Camp, Tuolumne Co., California
Died: Jan 4, 1982 (age 77), Oakland, Alameda Co., California; from a bad fall/head trauma
Buried: Graves Cemetery in Orland, Glenn Co., California
Married: Mar 21, 1950, Chellie D. “Sally” (Howard) Tuckey, Reno, Washoe Co., Nevada
One child: James Howard Mallon

2. Marjorie Maxine Mallon
Born: Jun 10, 1906, (probably Basalt), Eagle Co., Colorado
Died: Mar 14, 1988 (age 81), Walnut Creek, Contra Costa Co., California
Buried: Graves Cemetery, Orland, Glenn Co., California
Married: Jul 30, 1927, Stanley Roosevelt Truman, M.D., Oakland, Alameda Co., California
Two children: Carol Stanleigh Truman, James Carlton Truman

3. Neva Harriet Mallon
Born: Sep 19, 1908, Princeton, Colusa Co., California
Died: Nov 11, 2008 (age 100), Oakland, Alameda Co., California
Buried: Cremated, inurned in Graves Cemetery, Orland, Glenn Co., California
Married (1): Sep 10, 1931, Errington Goddard Aubin, West Derby, Orleans Co., Vermont
One child: Jacquelin Lee Aubin
Married (2): Jan 1, 1984, George Howard Kyme, Oakland, Alameda Co., California

4. Leslie Mallon (male)
Born: about 1911, Princeton, Colusa Co., California
Died: about 1912, Princeton, Colusa Co., California; failure to thrive
Buried: Princeton, Colusa Co., California

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Timeline and Records

Nine children of Clark Samuel Chatfield, Sr. & Mary Elizabeth Morrow:
1. Della Chatfield
1872 – 1919 (m. Elmer Ellsworth Chatfield)
2. Ora Lovina Chatfield
1873 – 1936 (m. Charles Elliot Shaw)
3. Clark Samuel Chatfield, Jr.
1876 – 1944 (m.1. Ida Ernestine Hyatt, m.2. Madge Rosa)
4. Arthur William Chatfield
1878 – 1959 (m. Ada B. Miller)
5. Willard James Chatfield
1880 – 1900
6. Mabel Clair Chatfield
1883 – 1960 (m. George Reuben Sawyer)
7. Jacquelin(e) Chatfield
1886 – 1964 (m. James Frederick Mallon)
8. Levi Tomlinson “Lee” Chatfield
1889 – 1949 (m. Martha W. Banning)
9. Marjorie Emma Chatfield
1893 – 1983 (m. Thomas Mitchel Tuck)

Twelve children of George Washington Mallon & Mary Ann Thompson:
1. James Frederick Mallon
1873 – 1944 (m. Jacquelin(e) “Jacq” Chatfield)
2. Ruth Jane Mallon
1874 – 1919 (m. Chris Nelson)
3. Katherine Pauline “Katie” Mallon
1876 – 1962 (m. Elfes T. Martin)
4. Charlotte Mallon
1878 – 1879
5. George Edward Mallon
1879 – 1946 (m. Kathryn Ford)
6. Seth Monroe Mallon
1881 – 1954 (m. Pink Bell)
7. Milton H. Mallon
1883 – 1883
8. Mary Malinda Mallon
1894 – 1973 (m. Roy James Giersch)
9. Sylvia Sinda Mallon
1886 – 1960 (m1. Walter Highland Fairchild, m.2 Charles H. Lord)
10. Vina A. Mallon
1888 – 1918 (m. Rubbie R. Richards)
11. Francis Marian Mallon (male)
1892 – 1970 (m. Doris E. Constable)
12. Ida Ann Mallon
1894 – 1987 (m. William Roscoe French)

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Feb 3, 1886: Birth of Jacqueline Chatfield, 7th child of Clark Samuel Chatfield and Mary Elizabeth Morrow, in Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado

Jun 8, 1900: Federal Census for Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado:
Chatfield, C.S.: head, born Jan 1839, age 61, married, married 30 years, born Ohio, father born Ohio, mother born Ohio, merchandise store
Mary E.: wife, born Sep 1841, age 58, married, married 30 years, 10 children born, 8 living, born Illinois, father born Illinois, mother born Illinois (note: Mary born 1850)
Arthur: son, born Aug 1878, age 21, born Nebraska, father born Ohio, mother born Illinois, R.R. (railroad) laborer
Mabel: daughter, born Oct 1883, age 16, born Colorado, father born Ohio, mother born Illinois, Book Keeper
Jacqueline: daughter, born Feb 1886, age 14, born Colorado, father born Ohio, mother born Illinois
Levi: son, born Sep 1888, age 11, born Colorado, father born Ohio, mother born Illinois
Margaret: daughter, born Nov 1893, age 6, born Colorado, father born Ohio, mother born Illinois

Jun 13, 1900: Federal Census for Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado:
Mallon, J.F.: head, born Nov 1874, age 25, single, born Kansas, father born Missouri, mother born Canada English, farmer, rents farm, 30 animals
Geo. E.: brother, born Feb 1879, age 21, single, born Kansas, father born Missouri, mother born Canada English

Feb 2, 1901: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 3):
El JEBEL ITEMS.
The El Jebel literary society met on last Thursday evening, and an interesting program was rendered, among which was a recitation by Jacqueline Chatfield, and a song by Mabel Chatfield, both of Basalt. There was also a spelling match, in which Jacqueline Chatfield and Will Balcom came out victorious.

Apr 13, 1901: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 2):
School Entertainment.
Next Friday evening the Basalt public schools will give an entertainment at I.O.O.F. hall, the proceeds will go towards purchasing a flag for the school. A program has been carefully prepared, which will be rendered by the school children. This entertainment will be given for a worthy cause, and every one should turn out and help swell the receipts. Admission on 25 cents; children under fifteen years, 15 cents. Don’t miss it, as our school needs a flag.
“Long may it wave.”
Following is the evening’s program (partial list included in the line-up of 25 performances):
Mu… Glenwood Mandolin Club
Pantomime… Jacqueline Chatfield, Claude Russell, Albert Harris
Recitation—Ralph Bates
Vocal Solo—Bertha Sebring
Dialogue—Blanche Smith, Olive Troendly, Fannie Hartson, Guy Russell, Harry Nelson, Albert Harris
Poem and Parody—Blanche Smith, Jacqueline Chatfield
Note: Jacqueline (age 15) and her two friends Bert (Bertha) Sebring and Blanche Smith performed in several school productions together.

Above photo by Kirwin Studio in Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado, circa 1901: Blanche Smith, Bert Sebring & Jacqueline Chatfield

Jul 6, 1901: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 3):
** LOCAL **
Jim Mallon was jumping sideways at Aspen’s big celebration.

Aug 24, 1901: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 3):
Emma Pencilings
J.F. Mallon has bought 180 tons of alfalfa; consideration, $5.

Dec 14, 1901: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 3):
** LOCAL **
Clark S. Chatfield, Jr., and J.F. Mallon will open their new meat market Monday, December 16, first door west of postoffice. They will handle meat both wholesale and retail. We predict for them an astonishing success.

Dec 14, 1901: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 3):
Clark Chatfield and Jim Mallon, assisted by Clark’s dog, Shep, killed a bob-cat last Friday, near Peterson’s
ranch. They brought the feline home and “peeled” it and Jim says he will have a rug made of it and hold it in readiness as a present to his wife. Hope you won’t have to wait long, Jim.

Clark Chatfield and Jim Mallon

Dec 21, 1901: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 3):
LOCAL
Chatfield & Mallon’s meat market opened up last Tuesday noon and has had a rush of business since. They handle a well selected stock of meats and canned goods. There is no need of climbing the hill, good people; just step in at Chatfield & Mallon’s. They will treat you right and do it all the time. First door west of postoffice.
Chatfield & Mallon received a consignment of fresh oysters and Eastonville creamery butter this morning, which can be had at lowest prices.

Dec 21, 1901: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 3):
BASALT BUSINESS DIRECTORY.
C.S. CHATFIELD, Dealer in Groceries, Meats, Hardware, Lumber, Hay and Grain

Dec 28, 1901 and Jan 4/11/18/25, 1902: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 3):
BASALT BUSINESS DIRECTORY.
CHATFIELD & MALLON Fresh and Salt Meats, Canned Goods.

Mar 1, 1902: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 3):
Mr. and Mrs. Harry Pinger gave a grand ball last Wednesday evening to their many friends of Emma and Basalt. The upper floor of their large warehouse was called into service for the affair. A large crowd was present, and Mr. and Mrs. Pinger succeeded in providing everybody with a good time. Daggett’s orchestra, of Aspen, furnished the music and prompting. At midnight refreshments were served. The dancing continued until 2:30 a.m. All those who attended expressed themselves in high praise of the entertainment accorded them by their generous hosts. All kinds of vehicles were called into requisition in Basalt to convey the merrymakers to Emma. Those present were: …, Jacqueline Chatfield, …, Clark Chatfield, Ed and Jim Mallon, ….

Apr 5, 1902: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 2):
FOR SALE, OR TRADE
FOR RANGE CATTLE.
The following named property:
One mare, 6 years old, weight 26oo.
One Studebaker Wagon, (good as new.)
Twenty good milk cows with calves by their side.
One 14 inch John Deere walking plow, new.
One 14 inch Canton Clipper, walking plow.
One Lever Harrow.
One Cultivator.
One Potato Pitcher.
One Buggy, only been run a few times.
Two sets single harness.
Two sets double harness, (good as new.)
JAMES MALLON. Call on or address James F. Mallon, Box 53, Basalt, Colo.

Apr 12, 1902: Glenwood Post, Glenwood Springs, Garfield Co., Colorado (pg 8):
BASALT.
Mr. Jim Mallon, Miss Jacqueline Chatfield and Mrs. Dr. Gill took in the dance at Pinger’s store Thursday evening.

May 24, 1902: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 2):
From the Aspen Democrat
Jim Mallon of Basalt, was in this city Tuesday looking into all the furniture stores in the place in search of some suitable furniture to furnish his nice little three-roomed house in Basalt. Now, what’s this all for? Jim says he is going to rent that house furnished hereafter and he wants some real nice furniture in it, too. That don’t look reasonable to any sane person unless he is going to rent it to Mr. and Mrs. James Mallon. The furniture he selected was done with the assistance of a member of the fair sex and her wishes were followed in every detail, so it looks like Jim would have to ‘fess up.

Jun 12, 1902: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 3):
The Misses Mable and Jacqueline Chatfield gave a cobweb part on Tuesday evening and a very pleasant time is reported by all who attended. Music and wit abounded.
Those present were Dr. Gill and wife, Mr. and Mrs. Sampsel, Mrs. Chatfield, Miss Baell, Helen Gill, The Misses Chatfield, and Mrs. Ruland. The Mssrs. Mallon, Norstrom, Lapham, Schmeuser and Levi Chatfield.

Nov 8, 1902: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 3):
Jas. Mallon went to Aspen Thursday on business.

Nov 9, 1902: Marriage of Jacqueline Chatfield (age 16) to James Frederick Mallon (age 29) in Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado..

Nov 9, 1902: Marriage Certificate for Jacqueline Chatfield and James Mallon:
CERTIFICATE OF MARRIAGE
I, T.S. Leland, a Minister of the Gospel residing at Basalt in the County of Eagle in the State of Colorado do certify that, in accordance with the authority on me conferred by the above License, I did, on this 9th day of November in the year A.D. 1902, at Basalt in the County of Eagle in the State of Colorado, solemnize the Rites of Matrimony between James F. Mallon of Basalt in the County of Eagle of the State of Colorado and Jacqueline Chatfield of Basalt of the County of Eagle of the State of Colorado in the presence of Mary E. Chatfield and E.F. Martin.
WITNESS my hand and seal, at the County aforesaid, this
9th day of November A.D. 1902.
T.S. Leland
Pastor M.E. Church
Note: Mary Elizabeth (Morrow) Chatfield witnessed and signed her daughter’s marriage certificate.

Nov 15, 1902: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 3):
** LOCAL **
A marriage license was issued several days ago to Jacqueline Chatfield and J.F. Mallon, both of Basalt, but owing to their wishing to keep their wedding a secret from friends the Democrat refrained from publishing the item until now.—Aspen Democrat.
Married Sunday.
Sunday evening witnessed the marriage of two of Basalt’s prominent young people, Miss Jacqueline Chatfield and Mr. James F. Mallon. The ceremony was performed by Mr. Leland.
The happy event had been expected for some time, but the couple succeeded in keeping the date from the public until it was all over.
Both young people are well and favorably known in Basalt and their many friends and THE JOURNAL unite in extending them best wishes for a long and happy life, crowned with contentment and an abundance of the world’s best.
Note: Jacqueline was age 16 and James Mallon was a week short of 29. It may have been around the time Jacqueline dropped the e from her first name.

Nov 15, 1902: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 2):
El Jebel Items
Mssrs. Chatfield and Mallon was branding and dehorning their cattle at the Morrison ranch this week.

Dec 20, 1902: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 3):
A shipment of cattle was made to the Denver market last week by S.P. Sloss, Al Gray, Gib Cookman and Jim Mallon. They report good prices.
I.W. Chatfield of Denver came in Friday morning.

Jan 10, 1903: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 1):
Installation Ceremonies
The Knights of Pythias and the Rathbone Sisters held a joint installation and reception Friday which was attended by a large number of guests. The program was an entertaining one and as follows…
The new officers are as follows:
KNIGHTS OF PYTHIAS
C.C. Clark Chatfield
V.C. Dr. Gill
M.A. James Mallon…

Jan 17, 1903: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 1):
** LOCAL **
James Mallon is circulating a petition for the appointment of C.S. Chatfield as water commissioner of this district.

Dec 5, 1904: Birth of James DeVere “DeVere” Mallon, 1st child of James Mallon and Jacquelin Chatfield, in Chinese Camp, Tuolumne Co., California

Note: Since Grandpa James Mallon was always interested in railroads and probably in gold as well, and DeVere was their first child, it doesn’t surprise me that Jacquelin (Nana) was surprised there at Chinese Camp with the birth of her first child. ~Carol (Truman) Olson, granddaughter of James Frederick Mallon & Jacquelin Chatfield

May 5, 1905: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 1):
** LOCAL **
We received a letter from J.F. Mallon, a former resident of Basalt, a few days ago. Mr. Mallon is now located at Princeton, California. He says that Levi Chatfield arrived safe and sound and is enjoying himself among the roses and orange blossoms. Mr. Mallon invites all his Basalt friends to call and see him when in California.

Mar 6, 1906: Death of Clark Samuel Chatfield, Sr. (age 67), in Princeton, Colusa Co., California of Bright’s disease and acute uremia (a toxic condition resulting from kidney disease in which there is retention in the bloodstream of waste products normally excreted in the urine). Clark had been staying for some months with his daughter, Jacquelin (Chatfield) Mallon.

Mar 8, 1906: Colusa Daily Sun, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
CLAY S. CHATFIELD PASSES AWAY
Clay S. Chatfield died at the home of his daughter, Mrs. J.F. Mallon, at Princeton on Tuesday, March 6th, after a short illness. The deceased had only been a resident of Princeton about ten months, but during his short stay endeared himself to a great number of people.
Deceased was a native of the east, aged 67 years.
The funeral will take place this Wednesday afternoon from the home of Mrs. Mallon, the Rev. Mr. Davidson officiating.
Note: Clark S. Chatfield; name mistakenly printed as Clay in the article.

Jun 2, 1906: Basalt Journal, Basalt, Eagle Co., Colorado (pg 1):
LOCAL AND PERSONAL
Mrs. J.F. Mallon arrived from Princeton, California, and will make an extended visit with her mother, Mrs. C.S. Chatfield.

Jun 10, 1906: Birth of Marjorie Maxine Mallon, 2nd child of James Mallon and Jacquelin Chatfield, (probably in Basalt), Eagle Co., Colorado, while Jacquelin was staying with her mother.

Note: I think Nana would have gone to Basalt to comfort her mother (who’s husband Clark S. Chatfield, Sr. died on Mar 6, 1906) as well as to be with her to deliver Marjorie. ~Carol (Truman) Olson, granddaughter of James Frederick Mallon & Jacquelin Chatfield

Sep 11, 1908: Colusa Daily Sun, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
PRINCETON, Sept. 10. —Tuesday W.A. Cory and J.F. Mallon visited all of the water users on the Boggs and Packer tracts in the capacity of collector for the water rent, which is $1 an acre for the season and the company, provides 30 inches of water. September Ist is collection day for water rent. It was gratifying to Messrs. Cory and Mallon to find every body satisfied and prepared to pay up. Of course in a few cases where parties had bought this summer and laterals had been thrown up to get water to them at once, some trouble was experienced in getting as full head to them as desired because of the difficulty in getting the water through the newly made embankments. These troubles are no fault of the company and every body is reasonable about it.

The Company has 44 miles of laterals on the Boggs and Packer tracts and it is said about the same on the Glenn estate. All of this ditch system is covered by a telephone system that Centers at the residence of J.F. Mallon.

Beside the canal phone which extends to Willows as well as over 80 of ditches there is in this home the phones of the Sunset and the Colusa companies. Mallon leaves home about 5:30 to attend to the business of the company and drives until anywhere from 7 p.m. until midnight, returning home takes up the phone business that has been attended through the long hours of his absence by his frail wife. It is safe to say that she has been called every five minutes during the day with somebodys order or somebodys complaint about water. And yet she says, “don’t you dare tell about what I do for its just to help Jim you know.” But we do dare, we dare in give the Sacramento Valley Land Co. a deep, deep hint of the free unfailing service given them by a frail mother with sickly fretful children to care for. The company receives the services of two for the cost of one—and yet she says “Don’t tell for I’m the better half you know—and I do it for Jim.”

Sep 19, 1908: Birth of Neva Harriet Mallon, 3rd child of James Mallon and Jacquelin Chatfield, in Princeton, Colusa Co., California

Sep 19, 1908: Colusa Daily Sun, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
BORN.
MALLON —In Princeton, Sept. 19th, 1908, to the wife of J.F. Mallon, a daughter.

Note for above photo: I’m fairly certain your car is a Maxwell, around a 1907 model. It’s got canted front fenders and a brass radiator shell that was different from those on other manufacturers’ cars at the time, in that it had a horizontal bar above the motor crank. Most cars then had cowl-mounted gas lamps, but headlamps like those in your photo were optional. At that time, some cars were right-hand drive. —Steven E. Smith, Oxford, Connecticut (fellow researcher and headstone, history, and automobile identification buff)

Apr 21, 1910: Federal Census for 5th Township, Glenn Co., California:
Mallon, James F.: head, age 36, married 8 years, born Kansas, father born Missouri, mother born Scotland, general farmer, Sacramento Valley Irr. Co.
Jacqueline: wife, age 24, married 8 years, 3 children born, 3 children living, born Colorado, father born Ohio, mother born Missouri
Devere J.: son, age 5, born California, father born Kansas, mother born Colorado
Marjory: daughter, age 3, born California, father born Kansas, mother born Colorado
Neva: daughter, age ?, born California, father born Kansas, mother born Colorado (note: age 17 mo)
Note: 15 other people reside at the same address, a servant, a cook, and the rest work for Sacramento Irrigation Company

Above professional photos taken Aug 15, 1910
James DeVere Mallon (5 yr 8 mo) & Marjorie Maxine Mallon (4 yr 8 mo)
Neva Harriet Mallon (23 mo)

about 1911: Birth of Leslie Mallon, a boy, 4th child of James Mallon and Jacquelin Chatfield, in Princeton, Colusa Co., California

about 1911: Death of Leslie Mallon, assuming in Princeton, Colusa Co., California, from failure to thrive. He is buried in the Princeton Cemetery, as is his grandfather, Clark Samuel Chatfield, Sr. who died in 1906.

Jan 4, 1912: Sacramento Union, Sacramento, Sacramento Co., California:
PRINCETON MAN TO BUILD S.P. BRANCH
J.F. Mallon Gets Contract for Hamilton City-Harrington Railroad.
Special to the Union.
PRINCETON, Colusa Co.), Jan 3— J.F. Mallon of this town has been awarded the contract for the grading of the Colusa and Hamilton City branch of the Southern Pacific railroad. The contract was awarded last month in San Francisco, but the news that the Princeton man was the successful bidder only became known today.
Work on the construction of the roadbed must be commenced at once. It is planned to have the road in operation by August 1 of this year.
The length of the projected road is 61 miles from Hamilton City to Harrington on the main westside road of the Southern Pacific south of Arbuckle. The road will pass through Grimes, Sycamore, Colusa and Princeton.

June 28, 1914: Beginning of World War I
The spark that set off World War I came on June 28, 1914, when a young Serbian patriot shot and killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir to the Austro-Hungarian Empire (Austria), in the city of Sarajevo. The assassin was a supporter of the Kingdom of Serbia, and within a month the Austrian army invaded Serbia. As a result of the military alliances that had formed throughout Europe, the entire continent was soon engulfed in war. Because European nations had numerous colonies around the world, the war soon became a global conflict.
https://www.facinghistory.org/resource-library/beginning-world-war-i

Aug 11, 1914: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
PERSONALS AND NEWS
J.F. Mallon and son, Ed Mallon, A.W. Chatfield, Lee Chatfield and Clark Chatfield were off today on a deer slaying expedition to the wilds of the Sierras.

Jan 25, 1915: Colusa Daily Sun, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
PRINCETON NOTES
Mr. and Mrs. Chas. Chatfield and Mr. and Mrs. Jas. Mallon visited near Colusa Friday.
Lee Chatfield was a visitor from the rice camp Saturday evening.

Sep 15, 1915: Colusa Daily Sun, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
NEWS ITEMS FROM PRINCETON
Lee Chatfield and Eva Keeran spent Sunday in Willows.
Mr. and Mrs. Jas. Mallon, Chas. Chatfield and Lee Chatfield motored to Los Molinas Sunday to visit Mrs. Chas. Chatfield.
Note: Chas. Chatfield (my grandfather) was working in the Princeton rice fields. My grandmother Nellie was pregnant and gave birth to my mother, Noreen Ellen Chatfield, 14 days after this visit by her husband and his cousins. —Catherine (Clemens) Sevenau

Sep 29, 1915: Birth of Noreen Ellen “Babe” Chatfield, 10th and last child of Charles Chatfield & Nellie Chamberlin, in Los Molinos, Tehama Co., California

Oct 1, 1915: Red Bluff Daily News,Tehama Co., California:
WOMAN ALL ALONE GIVES BIRTH
CHILD TAKES CARE OF IT
LOS MOLINOS. Sept. 30 (1915)—When a baby girl was born last night to Mrs. C.H. Chatfield of this place, the woman, unaided except by some of her small children, rose from her bed, washed and dressed the child and performed functions of physician or mid-wife. The husband is away from home working in the rice fields at Princeton. Before the child was born Mrs. Chatfield sent for a neighbor woman, who, however, did not arrive until after the child was born and cared for. Both mother and child are apparently doing well. This is the tenth child born in the family.
Note: daughters Nellie May was 13 and Verda was 8. It is unlikely the boys participated.

Note: Charles Chatfield, a cousin of Jacquelin (Chatfield) Mallon and Levi Tomlinson “Lee” Chatfield, lives in Los Molinos, Tehama Co., California. Pictured here a year later in Chico with their tenth and last child, my mother.

As I Was Told:
In the first year of moving to Los Molinos, my grandfather, Charles H. Chatfield, acquired a team of twelve draft horses and during the yearly April and May planting season hired himself out to local farmers in and around the rice towns of Princeton, Williams, Maxwell, and Colusa. The area was the largest rice-producing region in the state, the Sacramento River keeping the soil inundated with water, the heavy clay unsuitable for most crops perfect for rice. My grandfather acted as the work crew foreman, traveling from farm to farm, including those owned by his Chatfield and Mallon cousins. Charles’ three oldest sons (who had quit their schooling as young boys to work on the family cattle ranches in Wyoming and Montana) now worked alongside their father in the fertile green fields of California. Education was often not a priority for ranchers and farmers in those days—survival was. —Catherine (Clemens) Sevenau

In 1919, tractors replaced the horse teams. Charley and Leo came home from the Great War and Howard returned to Chico with a young English wife. By the end of 1920, my grandfather—along with his team of twelve horses—was put out to pasture.

Nov 9, 1915: Colusa Daily Sun, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
RICE LAND DEAL CLOSED FRIDAY
A deal that has been pending for several weeks was consummated in San Francisco Friday afternoon when R.E. Blevins and J.F. Mallon transferred to the Rice Land and Product Company, 3200 acres of rice land and irrigation system. The consideration was $250,000. The Blevins and Mallon rice plantation was the largest project of its kind in California, and was a factor in the development of the rice industry in Colusa county. All of the land is planted to rice and is under lease to the growers. It is stated that the new owners will erect a large rice mill to handle the crop next year.

May 12, 1916: Sacramento Union, Sacramento, Sacramento Co., California:
Big Rice Project Opens Near Colusa
Pumping Equipment Completed and One of the State’s Largest Plantations Begins Operations.
The Blevins & Mallon rice plantation, between Colusa and Princeton, one of the biggest rice projects in the state, is now in operation, following the completion of the pumping equipment last Saturday. C.F.Adams, who was in charge of the installation of the pumping plants, was in Sacramento yesterday, and has become enthused over the prospects afforded by rice in California. Adams intends to invest to a large extent in rice.
“Land which a few years ago in the district which I have just seen, could be purchased from $6 to $l0 per acre,” said Adams. “It was known as ‘goose land.’ With rice, this same land is made to pay as high as $80 an acre.”
The Blevins & Mallon project embraces 3000 acres, planted exclusively to rice. The pumping equipment consists of four pumps of the 24-inch size. These pumps are now in operation, flooding the land.

Apr 17, 1916: Sacramento Union, Sacramento, Sacramento Co., California:
BUY 6500-ACRE RANGE.
COLUSA, April 16.—R.E. Blevins of this city and J.F. Mallon of Princeton have purchased about 6500 acres of range land in Tehama and Trinity counties, about 14 miles east of Orland. Approximately 2700 head of ewes also changed hands in the deal. Blevins and Mallon will engage in the sheep business on an extensive scale.

Dec 30, 1916: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
Blevins-Mallon Project.
The work of widening and extending the main canal of the Blevins-Mallon project is progressing satisfactorily. When completed the new ditch will serve six thousand acres in addition to the one thousand or more acres served in the original project. Colusa County would be more rapidly developed if there were more men here possessed of the enterprise and business acumen of R.E. Blevins and J.F. Mallon.

Feb 6, 1917: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
Princeton News Events of Interest of Both Social and Personal Nature
LIVE NOTES FROM LIVE TOWN
Leo Chatfield, a cousin of Lee Chatfield and Mrs. James Mallon arrived Sunday. Leo was a member of the Red Bluff Militia which spent the summer in Nogales.
Note: Leo is the son of Charles and Nellie Chatfield of Los Molinos, California

Nov 8, 1917: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
PRINCETON
Mrs. J.F. Mallon motored to Colusa Monday to meet her sister, Mrs. Tom Tuck.
The Missionary Society held a very pleasant meeting at the home of Mrs. N.H. McAuslin Wednesday. Those present were: Mrs. L.C. Smith, Mrs. N.S. Voder, Mrs. Tom Tuck, Mrs. C. Archer, Mrs. F.M. Porter, Mrs. J.F. Mallon, Mrs. Tom Dawson.
J.F. Mallon is in San Francisco on a business trip.

Dec 18, 1917: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
PRINCETON PERSONAL AND OTHER ITEMS OF INTEREST TO READERS OF THE HERALD
The Sunday school is making preparations for the usual Christmas exercises. Rev, J.C. Squires, Methodist Sunday school superintendent Subscriptions received at Princeton for National Y.M.C.A. and Y.W.C.A, War Work, Friday evening. December 4, 1917: J. F. Mallon, $5O;  Bank of Princeton, $20; Lee Chatfield, $10; Martha Banning, $10; Mrs. Arthur W. Chatfield, $10; Arthur Chatfield, $10; Lester (sic: Leslie) Chatfield, $5; James D. Mallon $5; Minola Chatfield $5
Note: approximately 50 citizens were included on this list

Jan 12, 1918: Weekly Colusa Sun, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
10,000 MORE ACRES IN RICE THIS YEAR; BLEVINS AND MALLON GET 4,000
Between 8,000 and 10,000 more acres of land will go into rice this season, according to Attorney I.G. Zumwalt, who is in a position to know just what is doing in rice circles. Of this large increase between 3800 and 4000 acres of the increase will be put in by Blevins and Mallon, who have just closed several deals, one with Zumwalt for 800 acres and another with J.F. Campbell and another with the Superior California Land and Investment company, aggregating the amount specified. It is believed that 1918 will be the greatest rice year in the history of the country. According to best estimate there were 16,000 acres in rice last season. The added acreage will raise the total acreage to well over the 25,000 acre mark. Already Colusa is second in the state, being next to Butte in rice acreage. Unless Butte makes some vast strides in the coming two years Colusa will have passed her. In fact if those who want to increase their acreage were able to get the water this year, it is said that Colusa would be close to front rank in rice production. Blevins and Mallon will have a great tract in this year and are already preparing to meet the demands for water to be made upon the co-partnership. A crew of men are at work now installing a big pumping plant between Colusa and Maxwell.

As I Was Told:
1918: The Mallon Blevins company that Thomas Tuck (husband of Marjorie [Chatfield] Tuck) worked for was my grandpa and his partner’s drayage business, in Colusa, I think. It eventually failed, and rather than declare bankruptcy (which Mr. Blevins did) Grandpa endeavored to pay off all his creditors. He was a very proud man, and during the Great Depression, he refused the free red paint the Government offered for his barn and outbuildings—the red buildings would have been a tip-off that he was destitute, and he would have none of that! –Jacqui (Mallon) Ewing.

Robert Edward “R.E.” Blevins 
Son of Michael Robert Blevins & Elizabeth Wakefield
Born: Jan 9, 1877, Benton Co., Arkansas
Died: Sep 4, 1961, Oakland, Alameda Co., California
Married: Lula Harden (1881 – 1964)
Five children:
1. Robert Harden Blevins (1908 – 2004)
2. Elizabeth Lucy Blevins (1910 – 1981)
3. Dorothy Lovelace Blevins (1911 – 1976)
4. Azile Carolyn Blevins (1916 – 2011)
5. George Leroy Blevins (1921 – 1976)

Above photo was taken circa 1918 or 1919, around the time the family moved from Princeton to Oakland

June 28, 1918: End of World War I (The Great War) 
World War I (1914-1918) was finally over. This first global conflict had claimed from 9 million to 13 million lives and caused unprecedented damage. Germany had formally surrendered on November 11, 1918, and all nations had agreed to stop fighting while the terms of peace were negotiated. On June 28, 1919, Germany and the Allied Nations (including Britain, France, Italy, and Russia) signed the Treaty of Versailles, a city in France 10 miles outside of Paris, formally ending the war.
http://www.americaslibrary.gov/jb/jazz/jb_jazz_ww1_1.html

1918: History of Colusa and Glenn Counties, California:

Jan 11, 1919: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
MRS. MALLON, 3 CHILDREN MOTHER, SISTER, NEPHEW, HAVE FLU IN SAME HOUSE
Mrs. J.F. Mallon and three children, Devere, Marjorie and Neva, of Princeton, have the influenza in Oakland, Mrs. Tom Tuck of Princeton Is also down with the malady in the same house, as is Mrs. Chatfield, the mother of Mrs. Mallon and Mrs. Tuck, and Leslie Chatfield, Mrs. Mallon’s and Mrs. Tuck’s nephew, making seven in the house suffering of the flu. Getting nurses has been a difficult matter. Mr. Tuck conducted a search In the bay cities, and Mr. Mallon In the valley. Finally one was found and a good one. Then Mr. Mallon engaged Mrs. Rose Miller of Colusa as the day nurse, and rushed her in an auto to the house of sickness. When they arrived in the evening, Mrs. Miller was tired and Mr. Mallon sent her to a hotel to rest for the night. Next morning she, too, was sick and had to be brought home at once.

The Influenza Pandemic of 1918
The influenza pandemic of 1918-1919 killed more people than the Great War, known today as World War I (WWI), at somewhere between 20 and 40 million people. It has been cited as the most devastating epidemic in recorded world history. More people died of influenza in a single year than in four years of the Black Death Bubonic Plague from 1347 to 1351. Known as “Spanish Flu” or “La Grippe” the influenza of 1918-1919 was a global disaster.

In the fall of 1918 the Great War in Europe was winding down and peace was on the horizon. The Americans had joined in the fight, bringing the Allies closer to victory against the Germans. Deep within the trenches these men lived through some of the most brutal conditions of life, which it seemed could not be any worse. Then, in pockets across the globe, something erupted that seemed as benign as the common cold. The influenza of that season, however, was far more than a cold. In the two years that this scourge ravaged the earth, a fifth of the world’s population was infected. The flu was most deadly for people ages 20 to 40. This pattern of morbidity was unusual for influenza which is usually a killer of the elderly and young children. It infected 28% of all Americans. An estimated 675,000 Americans died of influenza during the pandemic, ten times as many as in the world war. Of the U.S. soldiers who died in Europe, half of them fell to the influenza virus and not to the enemy. An estimated 43,000 servicemen mobilized for WWI died of influenza. 1918 would go down as unforgettable year of suffering and death and yet of peace. As noted in the Journal of the American Medical Association final edition of 1918: “The 1918 has gone: a year momentous as the termination of the most cruel war in the annals of the human race; a year which marked, the end at least for a time, of man’s destruction of man; unfortunately a year in which developed a most fatal infectious disease causing the death of hundreds of thousands of human beings. Medical science for four and one-half years devoted itself to putting men on the firing line and keeping them there. Now it must turn with its whole might to combating the greatest enemy of all–infectious disease.

The pandemic affected everyone. With one-quarter of the US and one-fifth of the world infected with the influenza, it was impossible to escape from the illness. Even President Woodrow Wilson suffered from the flu in early 1919 while negotiating the crucial treaty of Versailles to end the World War (Tice). Those who were lucky enough to avoid infection had to deal with the public health ordinances to restrain the spread of the disease. The public health departments distributed gauze masks to be worn in public. Stores could not hold sales, funerals were limited to 15 minutes. Some towns required a signed certificate to enter and railroads would not accept passengers without them. Those who ignored the flu ordinances had to pay steep fines enforced by extra officers. Bodies pilled up as the massive deaths of the epidemic ensued. Besides the lack of health care workers and medical supplies, there was a shortage of coffins, morticians and gravediggers. The conditions in 1918 were not so far removed from the Black Death in the era of the bubonic plague of the Middle Ages.

In 1918-19 this deadly influenza pandemic erupted during the final stages of World War I. Nations were already attempting to deal with the effects and costs of the war. Propaganda campaigns and war restrictions and rations had been implemented by governments. Nationalism pervaded as people accepted government authority. This allowed the public health departments to easily step in and implement their restrictive measures. The war also gave science greater importance as governments relied on scientists, now armed with the new germ theory and the development of antiseptic surgery, to design vaccines and reduce mortalities of disease and battle wounds. Their new technologies could preserve the men on the front and ultimately save the world. These conditions created by World War I, together with the current social attitudes and ideas, led to the relatively calm response of the public and application of scientific ideas. People allowed for strict measures and loss of freedom during the war as they submitted to the needs of the nation ahead of their personal needs. They had accepted the limitations placed with rationing and drafting. The responses of the public health officials reflected the new allegiance to science and the wartime society. The medical and scientific communities had developed new theories and applied them to prevention, diagnostics and treatment of the influenza patients.
by Molly Billings, June 1997 modified RDS February 2005
Source: https://virus.stanford.edu/uda/

Mar 6, 1919: Weekly Colusa Sun, Colusa, Colusa Co. California:
PRINCETON
Sergeant Lee Chatfield is home from France.
Mr. and Mrs. James Mallon and Tom Tuck were up from Colusa on Saturday.
DeVere Mallon is up from Oakland.

Jul 24, 1919: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
PERSONALS
O.E. Mallon of Maxwell, brother of J.F. Mallon, was In Colusa today. Mr. Mallon came to California last April from Colorado with his family. They will move to Colusa this fall. Mr. Mallon was a railroad conductor for seventeen years. C.E. Blevins of Williams was here today.

Sep 11, 1919: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
J.F. Mallon came up the first of the week from Oakland, where his family will spend the winter and the children will attend school.

Oct 30, 1919: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
80 PER CENT OF RICE IS THRESHED; HERE IS STORY OF HOW INDUSTRY BEGAN
Four Short Years Ago Mallon & Blevins Started First Project—Now Grown to $7,000,000 Business
About 80 per cent of the rice of Colusa county Is now threshed. The weather continues favorable and the remainder will be garnered with a speed and energy that excites enthusiasm. The crop has been running some 20 or 25 per cent short. Why? That’s hard to tell. It’s just short. Some say it was the warm spell and north wind of last month. But then the rice is good weight and excellent In quality and it would seem that a sudden onslaught of heat and parching wind would have deteriorated the cereal itself.

While the crop is short, it is sufficiently large to prove a money-maker to nearly every grower; and some will make killings of a really dazzling magnitude. It is now pretty safe to estimate the acreage at forty thousand. The average yield will not miss thirty sacks very far. And the price will average around $6. Here are figures to astound even the most stolid.

It is reasonably certain that $7,000,000 will be brought into the county from rice! Seven million dollars! And all this began not when Columbus discovered America, or when the daring forty-niners pushed across the mountains and deserts, but four years ago, when J.F. Mallon and R.E. Blevins leased 2900 acres of what seemed pretty trifling land from the Esperanza Land company west of the I.L. Compton ranch. They were going to put it in rice. They were going to put water on that questionable soil! Many were the people who sincerely regretted to see those young men throw away so much money. Heads were shaken sadly. Some were lenient enough to express doubt only; but the majority had no doubts—they saw certain failure.

The land was leased—now just compare the prices with those of today! For 50 cents an acre for the first year, $2 an acre for the second and $3 for the third. But Mallon & Blevins had an option to buy—at the fabulous price of from $18 to $40 an acre. They swung into the great adventure with their customary spirit and vim. The dirt flew for ditches and chocks and in due season there was water and the crop was sown. Contrary to the fears of so many friends, it came up, too, and as the tedious months went on the strange stuff grew and thrived.

The cost of putting water on the land was $18 an acre. The same work would cost about $40 now. The California Rice company was one of first leases and by the way, the same company is still leasing from Mallon & Blevins, though on different acres, and has proved a steady, square and businesslike concern. “H,” one of the leading Japanese of the state, is at its head.

The first year’s crop finally came to harvest, quite late; and it cannot be denied there were worrysome days and nights before the binders at last got to work. The average yield was thirty-two sacks. The price was from 175 to $2.25. And everybody made money!

And now when harvest time came on, and even before, for that matter, men began to look with some hopeful interest at the project. At first a few went out to see just what Mallon & Blevins were doing, anyhow. Then as the rice got more height, and as one here and there thought it might prove all right—possibly—more went to see it. Before the cereal was in warehouse, possibly eight or ten thousand people had been to the field! There was Interest, real Interest, at last. Next year there were some ten thousand acres in rice In Colusa county. The Mallon & Blevins project was the first on the west side of the Sacramento valley. Oh, a few acres had boon experimented with In a desultory way up In Glenn county, but there was no decision. The experiments proved nothing. But the Mallon & Blevins project proved everything.

The two partners who started this great industry here were in town today. Asked if they believed the rice industry has come to stay, they spoke out with the clean-cut firmness that nothing can daunt. “Beyond question,” they said, “Water grass will be overcome, all obstacles will be beaten out. The rice industry is as solid as any industry anywhere!”

It is the opinion of Mallon & Blevins that rice growing will slowly fall into more hands. Men will take smaller plantations and work them more intensively. With a small field, water grass can be kept out. Farmers will live in town and operate from a quarter section to a section and make it pay handsomely. There’s no question about it, they believe, and they are not men who believe without reason.

Four years ago! To look at the rice business in Colusa county now one can scarcely help feeling it is old as the hills. Ancient history— years old! One hundred and seventy five thousand dollars came to the county for rice the first year. And seven millions this year! Four years. Where’s the man or woman who can adequately write this epic. If Eleanor Glyn would bestir herself to the monumental subject and give us a “Four Years” instead of an occasional “Three Weeks.” we’d have something worthwhile.

Mallon & Blevins are not sitting back on the oars and letting the ship of industry drift. They had a vision four years ago, a true vision big with prosperity, not alone for themselves, but for the valley as a whole And they have a still greater and bright visualization of the future now. They see the years to come filled with varied produce grown on these old Colusa county acres. Yes, on those old formerly neglected stretches of alkali Drainage is coming is almost here. Drainage will carry away the alkali and leave to cultivate virgin soil of inexhaustible fertility. Alfalfa will grow where the geese used to float majestically on hardpan ponds. The dairy farm, the gold-bearing hog, the fruit, orchard, we have some now, but in the not far distant future their numbers will be multiplied as the sands of the sea.

Nov 1, 1919: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
MALLON BUYS MARY T. DEAN PROPERTY TO BUILD HOME
J.F. Mellon has bought from the Mary T. Dean estate six lots on Tenth street (the highway) opposite the city park. The price paid was $11,000. Mr. and Mrs. Mallon will probably build a handsome modern home on the property next spring. The present house, facing the highway, which is now occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Ward B. Esterly, will likely be placed on the lots facing Eleventh street, and the new residence will occupy its site. The lots are finely shaded and are beyond question the most desirable which could be found in town. The new Mallon home will be just across Jay street from the splendid new residence of Mr. Mallon’s partner, R.E. Blevins.

Jan 25, 1920: Federal Census for Oakland Township, Alameda Co., California:
Mallan, James: head, age 45, married, born Kansas, father born Kansas, mother born Kansas, Promoter for irrigation (Mallon)
Jacquelin: wife, age 33, married, born Colorado, father born Ohio, mother born Missouri
De Vere: son, age 15, born California, father born Kansas, mother born Colorado (James)
Marjorie: daughter, age 13, born California, father born Kansas, mother born Colorado
Neva: daughter, age 11, born California, father born Kansas, mother born Colorado
Chatfield, Mary: mother-in-law, age 70, widowed, born Illinois, father born Nebraska, mother born Nebraska
Chatfield, Leslie: nephew, age 15, born Wyoming, father born Nebraska, mother born Illinois
Note: Mother-in-law is Mary Elizabeth Morrow. Her husband Clark Samuel Chatfield, Sr., died in 1906. Leslie Chatfield is the 2nd child of Arthur William Chatfield and Ada B. Miller, born Jul 1, 1904 in Tensleep, Colorado

Feb 26, 1920: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
BIG DREDGER HERE FOR WILLIAMS IRRIGATION DIST.
G.E. Mallon, who is assisting his brother, J.F. Mallon, superintendent of the Williams Irrigation district, in putting in the ditches for the proposed projects, announced today that a big dredger had arrived and would be working on the ditches as soon as if had been assembled. The greater portion of the dredger arrived today and the balance of it is expected in a few days. The dredgers are cutting great ditches, some of them fully twenty four feet deep. Superintendent Mallon intends to make the ditches of the Williams Irrigation district the best of any project in the state and has a large force of men working on them. The meeting of the land owners last Friday and their enthusiasm for the work, in addition to the offer made by one of the biggest bonding firms in San Francisco to purchase the bonds as soon as the district was formed and to finance the project by the immediate cashing of all warrants, has opened the eyes of the Williams people as to how the great project is regarded by the shrewdest business men of the state.

Nov 8, 1921: Sacramento Union, Sacramento, Sacramento Co., California:
STATE
LICENSES GRANTED
November 7, 1921.
Mallon & Blevins. 450 Market street, Colusa. J.F. Mallon, Cop. No. 1953. R.E. Blevins, Mem. Cop. No. 2026.

Feb 16, 1922: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
MALLON PRUNE LAND SELLS AT $800 AN ACRE
At a price said to be $800 an acre, J.F. Mallon recently sold a forty-acre prune orchard near Butte City to a Santa Clara man whose name has not yet been announced. The prune trees are six years old and the orchard is one of the best in the county.

Apr 3, 1922: Death of Mary Elizabeth (Morrow) Chatfield (age 72), at the home of her daughter, Jacquelin, on Lawton Street in Oakland, Alameda Co., California; of chronic nephritis

Apr 4, 1922: Burial of Mary (Morrow) Chatfield in the Mountain View Cemetery, Oakland, Alameda Co., California

Apr 6, 1922: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
Death of Mrs. Chatfield
Mrs. Chatfield, mother of Lee Chatfield of Princeton and Mrs. J.F. Mallon of Colusa and Oakland, died at her Oakland home Monday morning of complications following an attack of flu. She was about 75 years old. The funeral was held Tuesday afternoon in Oakland. Mrs. Chatfield was formerly a resident of Princeton where she was much loved by many friends for her kindly virtues and great sympathy and friendliness for everyone.

Apr 7, 1922: Colusa Daily Sun, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
MRS. CHATFIELD AT REST.
Funeral services for Mrs. Chatfield, mother of Lee Chatfield of Princeton and Mrs. J.F. Mallon of Oakland, were held in Oakland on Tuesday afternoon. She passed away early Monday morning at the age of 75 years. She formerly resided in where she was widely acquainted and known for her sympathetic nature and willingness to assist others in time of trouble.

Apr 11, 1922: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
PRINCETON
Lee Chatfield returned from Oakland yesterday where he was called by the illness of his mother, Mrs. Mary Chatfield, who passed away at the home of her daughter, Mrs. James Mallon, in Oakland. Mrs. Chatfield was an earnest Christian woman, greatly loved in this community where she lived for many years.

Jul 13, 1926: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
PRINCETON
Mrs. James Mallon was here Saturday and Sunday visiting her brother, Lee Chatfield. Mrs. Mallon is a former resident of Princeton and Colusa.

1926: U.S. City Directory, Oakland California:
James F Mallon
Gender: Male
Residence Year: 1926
Street address: h5302 Lawton Ave
Residence Place: Oakland, Alameda, Berkeley, California, USA
Occupation: Farmer
Spouse: Jacquelin Mallon

Jul 30, 1927: Marriage of Marjorie Maxine Mallon & Stanley Roosevelt Truman, in Oakland, Alameda Co., California

Jul 5, 1928: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
PRINCETON
Devere Mallon of Oakland is visiting in Princeton.

Nov 12, 1928: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
COLUSAN TO CONFER WITH U.S. OFFICIALS ON BUCK PRESERVE
J.F. Mallon To Find Out Government’s Reaction to Plan for Utilizing Low Priced Lands in Colusa and Glenn Counties
While J.F. Mallon is in Washington next week he will confer with officials on the plan to make a federal duck preserve out of the lower priced lands of Colusa and Glenn counties. A refuge is needed for wild ducks, it was pointed out when the plan was first suggested several years ago, and the government should provide such a refuge, since the government officials wish to protect the birds. The government would buy the land, according to the plan, thus relieving the farmers from taxes on land from which they can make but little profit.

Nov 19, 1929: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
CLARK CHATFIELD IS TAKEN TO S.F. HOSPITAL
Clark Chatfield of Williams, who has been seriously ill for some time, is somewhat improved. He was taken to the University Hospital in San Francisco this morning for treatment. His sister, Mrs. James Mallon, and his brothers, Lee Chatfield and Leo Chatfield accompanied him to the city.
Note: Leo (Leo Chatfield) is a cousin, the son of Clark’s cousin, Charles Chatfield of Chico.

Apr 4, 1930: Federal Census for Corning Township, Tehama Co., California:
Mallon, James F.: head, age 56, married, age 29 at 1st marriage, born Kansas, father born Missouri, mother born Kansas, farmer on a general farm
Jacquelin C.: wife, age 44, married, age 17 at 1st marriage, born Colorado, father born Indiana, mother born Missouri
James D.: son, age 25, born California, father born Kansas, mother born Colorado (De Vere)
Neva H.: daughter, age 22, born California, father born Kansas, mother born Colorado

Note: Pictured is the Allen T. Moore family who previously owned the home. Appears to be the aftermath of a foxhunt.

Pictured from left to right:
Three at left: Jacquelin and Jim Mallon; seated next to them at right, Jacquelin’s mother Madge Chatfield
Center group standing: Arthur W. Chatfield, James DeVere Mallon (son), Neva Mallon (daughter)
Center group sitting: Clark S. Chatfield, Jr. and Ada B. (Miller) Chatfield (wife of Arthur)
Group of four at right: Lee T. Chatfield w/cup in hand, two unidentified men, young girl is Yvonne Cade/Burns/Chatfield

Jun 19, 1930: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
MISS MALLON HOME
Miss Neva Mallon, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. J.F. Mallon, former Colusa residents, has returned to her home at Orland after completing a course at the Boston Conservatory of Music. Miss Mallon has been heard over the radio several times.

Sep 10, 1931: Marriage of Neva Harriet Mallon & Errington Goddard Aubin, in West Derby, Orleans Co., Vermont.

May 28, 1932: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
Neva Mallon, Former Colusa Girl, Keeps Her Marriage In Boston A Secret Nearly Year
Mr. and Mrs. J.F. Mallon of Orland, former Colusa residents, were greatly surprised this week when they received word of the marriage of their daughter, Miss Neva Harriet Mallon, to Errington Goddard Aubin, of Boston, Massachusetts. For nearly a year the couple kept their marriage, which took place in Boston early last fall, a secret. They had decided not to tell anyone they were married until the bride completed her studies at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, and that they have kept the secret well is evident. Mrs. Aubin attended Colusa high school when her parents lived here, Mr. Mallon being engaged at that time in farming a large tract of land which had been planted to rice. The family moved to Oakland, where Mrs. Aubin was graduated from the Polytechnic School, and later decided to return to this section. When her parents moved to Orland, Miss Mallon, whose ability as a musician attracted the attention of some of the country’s most noted critics, left for the east to enter the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. Her work at the conservatory was outstanding, and from time to time numerous splendid reports of her activity in musical circles were received both here and in Orland. She had been a student at the conservatory several years when the secret wedding came as a climax to a romance which had its inception in Boston. It is understood that the bride will, within a short time, visit her parents in Orland. Future plans of the couple have not been divulged, but it is presumed they will make their home in Boston, where Aubin holds a responsible position and is held in high esteem. The bride is a girl of rare charm and news of her wedding here, while belated, comes as a most pleasant surprise to all her friends.

Voter Registration Records 1930-1944
Name: James Frederick Mallon
Street address: Orland
Residence Place: Glenn, California, USA
Party Affiliation: Republican
Occupation: Farmer

Dec 29, 1932: Colusa Herald, Colusa, Colusa Co., California:
PRINCETON
Mr. and Mrs. J.M. Mallon of Orland and Jack Tuck of Oakland were visiting at the home of Lee Chatfield Wednesday.

Apr 11, 1940: Federal Census for Corning Township, Tehama Co., California:
Mallon, James D.: head, age 35, single, born California, college 5th or subsequent year, farmer (James DeVere Mallon)
Mallon, James F.: father, age 66, married, born Kansas, working on own account, college, 2nd year
Jacquelin: mother, age 54, married, born Colorado, high school, 2nd year

Note: These two pictures were taken in Orland, California in 1942

Apr 12, 1944: Death of James Frederick Mallon (age 70), in Oakland, Alameda Co., California, of a heart ailment

California Death Index:
Name: James Frederick Mallon
Gender: Male
Birth Date: 19 Nov 1873
Birth Place: Kansas
Death Date: 12 Apr 1944
Death Place: Tehama
Mother’s Maiden Name: Thompson
Father’s Surname: Mallon

Apr 13, 1944: The Chico Enterprise, Chico, Butte Co., California:
James Mallon, Successful Rancher Dies in Orland
ORLAND, April 13—(AP)—James F. Mallon, 70, who is believed to have developed the first rice acreage in Colusa county, died yesterday of a heart ailment after being ill since December. Mallon started rice production near Princeton in 1904, later moving to Glenn county.
Mallon came to Willows in 1906 and became associated with the Sacramento Valley irrigation company, later becoming general superintendent and having complete charge of all construction work and operation of the irrigation system.
In 1911 he resigned his position with this company, and went into business for himself, organizing the Maxwell Irrigation District and later the Compton-Delevan Irrigation District, constructing two large pumping plants for taking water from the Sacramento river and a complete distributing system for the irrigation of several thousand acres in each district.
A little more than 20 years ago Mallon acquired a large stock ranch consisting of 6,600 acres west of Orland and has made his home there since 1930.
He is survived by his wife, Mrs. Jacquelin Mallon; a son, James DeVere Mallon; two daughters, residing in Berkeley, and a brother Ed, of Colusa.
Funeral services will be held at the Orland Federated church, Saturday afternoon at 2:30.

Apr 13, 1944: Newspaper obit, Orland, Glenn Co., California:
J.F. Mallon
Claimed by Death
Funeral services will be held Saturday afternoon for James F. Mallon who died yesterday afternoon at his home west of Orland. Death was due to a heart ailment.

Born in Salinas, Kansas, in 1873, he was married in 1902 to Jacquelin Chatfield in Colorado. Upon coming to California, the couple settled at Princeton where he had a large part in the development of irrigation and reclamation districts in Glenn and Colusa counties.

He was among the first in planning the Central Valley Irrigation project, being vice-president of the California State Irrigation Association. He was in charge of the building of the Hamilton City-Harrington railroad. He also developed the first rice project in Colusa county.

The family moved to Orland in 1928, acquiring the Allen Moore ranch in the buttes, and engaged in the livestock business. He was an active member of the Federated Church here.

He is survived by his wife and three children, J.D. Mallon of Orland, Mrs. Stanley Truman and Mrs. Neva Aubin, both of Oakland. There is one brother, G.E. Mallon living in Colusa, and two brothers and four sisters, all living in Kansas.

Funeral rites will be held at the Federated Church at 2:30 Saturday afternoon, with interment in the Graves cemetery.

Apr 14, 1944: Newspaper obituary:
Services To Be Held Saturday For J.F. Mallon
James F. Mallon, pioneer of reclamation and land development of the Sacramento valley, community leader and prominent farmer of Orland, died at his home west of Orland Wednesday, April 12th, after an illness of several months. Born in Salina, Kansas, on November 19, 1873, Mr. Mallon was married in Colorado in 1902 to Jacqueline Chatfield, and they came to California and settled in Princeton, Colusa county.
Mr. Mallon was among the first in the planning of the Central Valley irrigation, being vice president of the California State Irrigation Association when it was formed. He had charge of the building of the Hamilton-Harrington railroad, known as the “Beet Line,” which runs from Wyo, north of Orland, through the rich river country and connects with the main line below Colusa.
Mr. Mallon pioneered much of the irrigation and reclamation districts and had the distinction of developing the first rice project in Colusa county.
In 1928 Mr. Mallon bought the Allen T. Moore ranch west of Orland along Stony Creek and since that time had devoted his time to the livestock business. Since coming to Orland he had been active in the work at the Orland Federated church.
Mr. Mallon is survived by his widow, Mrs. Jacquelin Mallon, one son, J.D. Mallon of Orland; two daughters, Mrs. Stanley R. Truman, and Mrs. Neva Aubin, both of Oakland; one brother G.E. Mallon of Colusa, and two brothers and four sisters, all of whom live in Kansas.
Services will be held Saturday afternoon at 2:30 at the Orland Federated church with interment at the Graves cemetery, west of Orland.

Apr 15, 1944: Burial of James Frederick Mallon in Graves Cemetery, Orland, Glenn Co., California.

Apr 17, 1944: Newspaper clipping:
Mallon Honored at Rites Saturday
The Federated church was filled Saturday by the friends who came to pay their last token of respect to J.F. Mallon. The front of the church was banked with flowers. Mrs. Neva Aubin, daughter of the deceased played her father’s favorite hymns as a prelude to the services. M.H. Beck, a lifelong friend, read a number of his favorite passages of scripture. Mrs. Smith and Mrs. Farrell sang, and Mrs. Norma Brown, of Oakland, sang one of his favorite songs. Dr. Simonds spoke simply and quietly of the deceased and the work he had done during a long and useful life.
Many friends and relatives from out of town were present, among them being the following: Mrs. Marjorie Tuck, Berkeley, Mrs. Marjorie Truman, Mrs. Neva Aubin, Oakland, Mr. and Mrs. A.W. Chatfield, Colusa, Mr. And Mrs. Lee Chatfield, Butte Meadows; Mrs. C.S. Chatfield, Williams; (et al).

Mar 21, 1950: Marriage of James DeVere “DeVere” Mallon & Chellie D. “Sally” (Howard) Tuckey, in Reno, Washoe Co., Nevada.
Note: Sally’s first marriage was to Harry Alred Tuckey (1889 – 1950) on Nov 11, 1939 in Berkeley, Alameda Co., California. They divorced and had no children. 

Dec 7, 1964: Death of Jacquelin (Chatfield) Mallon(age 78), in Oakland, Alameda Co., California, of a stroke

California Death Index:
Name: Jacquelin C Mallon
Gender: Female
Birth Date: 3 Feb 1886
Birth Place: Colorado
Death Date: 7 Dec 1964
Death Place: Alameda
Mother’s Maiden Name: Marrow (Morrow)

Dec 10, 1964: Orland newspaper, Orland, Glenn Co., California:
Services Held for Mrs. J.F. Mallon
Graveside services were held this afternoon at the Graves Cemetery here for Mrs. Jacqueline C. Mallon, 78, who died in Oakland on December 7 after a prolonged illness. A native of Colorado, she had lived in Oakland for the past 20 years, since the death of her husband, James. F. Mallon. The Mallons, who had been longtime residents of Colusa, moved to Orland to take over what had been known as the Allen T. Moore ranch. The homesite is now part of the Black Butte Reservoir.
Mrs. Mallon was active in the Federated Church and in community social affairs during her residence here.
She was the mother of James D. Mallon of Orland, Mrs. Stanley R. Truman and Mrs. Neva M. Aubin of Oakland, and sister of Mrs. Marjorie Tuck, also of Oakland. She had four grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren. Mrs. Mallon was a member of the College Avenue United Presbyterian Church of Oakland.
Note: The “C” in Jacqueline C. Mallon stood for Chatfield.

Dec 10, 1964: Cremated; interment of Jacquelin (Chatfield) Mallon’s ashes in Graves Cemetery, Orland, Glenn Co., California

May 1, 1995: Family story, by Jacquelin Ewing:
ON THE KNOLL
There is a place for me, there, another for my mother, and one for my husband, should he choose to occupy it. Others of the family have already arrived. My grandfather was the first —James Frederick Mallon, always known as J.F. Then came Nana (Jacquelin), then my uncle James De Vere Mallon (J.D., of course), and next his wife, Sally. They were married latish in life. Sally had been his college sweetheart, but it took them a long time to get together. It was a quarrelsome marriage and they had a lifetime of arguments to accomplish in a relatively small number of years. Lacking his favorite sparring partner, my uncle argued with anyone he could collar for the six years of life left to him following Sally’s death. Several years passed before the next arrival, my mother’s sister, Marjorie Mallon Truman. Her husband, Stanley, joined her in 1993.
Each new family occupant of the Graves Cemetery (just off Highway 32, west of Orland, California) was escorted by a caravan, a troupe family—a dwindling number of elder members and the occasional representative or two of the next generation. These heedless young ones would whoop and gallop among the leaning, mossy headstones at the “old” end of the grounds, while the rest of the party stood about and made small conversation, “Well, I see the Lindous haven’t been pruning the shrubs here lately,” or “Looks like the pyracantha is getting out of hand there next to the Glenns’ plot.” Recent arrivals were noted and commented upon.
I love this place. It occupies a windy knoll where the breeze lifts my hair, and brings to me the perfume of the neighboring dairy farm on the north—a splendid place of mud and green grass and alfalfa bales, a white barn and harlequin Holstein cows who view their world with acceptance and large, soft eyes. If I turn toward the south, I can count a dozen tiny ranch-houses, mostly ramshackle, each with its allotment of more-or-less dilapidated farm vehicles, randomly deployed chickens, a goat or two, and the inevitable clothesline bedizened with work-clothes, bedsheets and towels. Turning to the west, I look up into the buttes—foothills of the Yollabolly range. Here begins sheep country. My grandfather at one time owned a goodly portion of this land. It wasn’t especially desirable acreage, but sheep managed to thrive here, and a living could be made if the rains came, and the grasses flourished, and one didn’t lose too many head to coyotes and harsh winters.
On a spring day, there is nowhere lovelier than this knoll. The trampled grass smells peppery—sharp and clean and the wild mustard stripes the hillside with yellow from a giant painter’s brush. Golden poppies open to the sun—gaudy polka-dots flung across the waving green. There are olive trees. The breeze ripples through their gray leaves, with a sound like water tumbling over river-pebbles. Meadowlarks hurl their silvery cadenzas from fenceposts, and mourning doves croon softly to each other.
A specialized taste is required to appreciate this place in summer, for it is not then lovable. The lushness of spring has evaporated. The opportunistic grasses have dried to stubble, and the north wind blows a hot dry breath across the knoll. The weather is not friendly to the shrubs lovingly planted next a loved one’s resting-place. But in the evening, the ground-level markers retain the sun’s warmth, and rattlesnakes emerge from their daytime crannies to hunt for field mice, and to bask on the friendly, rough stones. They find no ill in the summer wind—as could no sincere lover of this unique and lonely spot.
In December of 1964, our family caravan escorted my grandmother’s ashes to the knoll. My tall, spare, sinewy “Nana” was as much a part of the land where she lived—just over the buttes and beyond Stony Creek in the next valley—as were the bending willows and the sturdy oak trees on the family ranch. She found glory in winter—each clap of thunder and flash of lightning. She loved the wind, although she was heard to remark, “The north wind just dries up the milk of human kindness in my veins!” Praise and thanks were given for sun and shower alike: all were part of God’s bounty. During the darkest storms she would simply sing a little louder, “Rock of Ages, Cleft for Me” or “Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam”.
By the time of our winter assembly at the graveside, a storm began to boil up over the hills, and the wind howled at us from every direction, stinging our faces with needles of cold. We stamped and snorted like horses anxious to return to the barn. As the short service drew to a close, above the roar of the wind, we heard the unmistakable honking of geese. Far above us, piercing tattered clouds, the ragged chevron appeared, great wings bearing them toward the south, calling encouragement amongst their ranks. We watched until we could see them no more. Then my mother said, “This is a day Nana would have loved!”
Any day on the knoll is a good day. It’s a fine place to rest.
Note: Jacqui Ewing, granddaughter of Jacquelin and James Mallon, daughter of Neva (Mallon) Aubin.

Siblings: Marjorie (Mallon) Truman 1906-1988, James DeVere Mallon 1904-1982 and Neva (Mallon) Aubin 1908-2008
on a windy day at Graves Cemetery, Orland, California

1993: Family story, by Jacquelin Ewing (grandaughter of Jacquelin (Chatfield) Mallon):
GRANDMOTHER
She was, without a doubt, an ungainly young girl, and she grew to be six feet tall. Tall women were not in vogue in the small mining towns of Colorado, nor were they in vogue anywhere else in the late 1800s. She was not a beauty, with her pronounced jaw, straight narrow lips, and legs like the trunks of young trees (long skirts would cover these until well into the next century). She was, apparently, the only child in her large family who was never graced with a middle name—if there was one we never knew it, and, somehow, we did not ask. Now there is no one left who could tell us.
At fifteen, she married a rancher from Kansas, eleven years her senior. He was kind, gentle, perhaps a bit weak. He saw in Jacquelin Chatfield the strength and spirit and gristle he lacked. She never let him down.
I do not think she ever went dancing, she never saw a theatre production, never tasted liquor. Her formal schooling did not stretch beyond the eighth or ninth grade, but her longing after knowledge lasted her lifetime. Books opened worlds to her: she told me “I read things I had no business reading—I read everything I could get my hands on.” She read Plutarch’s Lives, mythology, the Book of Mormon, old encyclopedias, history.
She must have read in the evening, by the light of kerosene lamps, during hours borrowed from precious sleep, for her days were filled with endless chores unassisted by the conveniences of city life. The washing was done in a galvanized tub, on a washboard whose legs were extended to accommodate her height. Wire clotheslines, strung between house and shed, billowed with sheets, towels and work-clothes and plain, serviceable undergarments. The laundry, stiff and smelling of sun, received its finishing touches from a series of irons with interchangeable handles, used in succession as they heated on the woodstove. They were called “sad-irons,” she couldn’t tell me why, but I knew: “Grandma, they’re called sad-irons because you feel ‘sad’ when you have to iron with them.”
If my grandmother felt sad about any of her domestic travails, no one ever knew it. She sang as she went about her chores—”I Come to the Garden Alone,” “Sweet Hour of Prayer,” The Old Rugged Cross,” with an occasional secular addition, perhaps “Let me Call you Sweetheart” or “A Bicycle Built for Two.”
My grandmother’s relationship with her Maker was solid and personal. Her Bible and Weymouth translation of the New Testament were limp with frequent use. She never missed her “quiet time” after lunch—a half-hour of meditation, scripture reading and prayer. Nighttime prayers were offered on her knees at bedside. She taught a women’s Bible class at the Federated Church in Orland. She was respected as a teacher and counted many of her pupils as friends, though I doubt that in her entire lifetime she ever had a true chum: it would have been impossible to imagine her exchanging girlish confidences with a contemporary.
She made the bread, grew vegetables, killed chickens, churned butter, made cottage cheese. During sheep-shearing season she would feed ten or twelve around the kitchen table, three meals a day. She made her own clothes on a New Home treadle sewing machine. The preferred style had a slightly gored skirt (“easier to move around in, and not bulky,”) and a wide collar with a bit of ruffle down the front (“I am so flat-chested”). The dresses were always of flowered cotton, purchased at J.C. Penney, the only department store in town, fifteen miles through the foothills, over a mostly dirt road. When the dresses were worn out, they were transmogrified into hot-pan holders, or given to the Ladies’ Circle for quilting squares.
I was delivered into the arms of Jacquelin Chatfield Mallon at the age of nine months and would call her “Mother” for the next several years. Her love for me was fierce, protective, and yearning, She was unique, and somehow frightening. To this day, I cannot tell you whether I loved her. She was the rock of my existence, my disciplinarian, my conscience. Most simply put, she defined the boundaries of my child’s world.

1994: Family story, by Jacquelin Ewing:
ATTIC WINDOW
The view from the attic window was not extraordinary. From it I could see down the slope of a gentle hill, leading to the road which connected the ranch with the main thoroughfare. There was never any through traffic, save for the rare driver who had lost his way in the unmarked, unpaved, dusty back roads of Tehama County. The ranch was the last stop. We lived, as my grandmother put it, “on the ragged edge of nowhere.”
For the first seven years of my life I lived on the ranch, thousands of acres of ungenerous land on which my grandparents made a marginal living, raising sheep, a few dairy cattle, and alfalfa. There was love enough to go around, and time now and then stolen away from chores; my grandmother taught me to read before my fourth birthday—it was, without a doubt, her greatest gift to me. Still, I was a child whose life was inward-focused, solitary and dreamy.
The attic was reached by means of a narrow and perilous stairway. The heat, as I climbed up on a summer day, would probably be more than I could bear today—it was a place no one visited in winter. I recall no discomfort: memories of oppressive heat or cold seem to be blessedly brief. What I can bring to mind in an instant is the smell of the sun-baked wood of the old walls, the sight of the blistered, flaking paint on the window sill, the sound of the wasps who made their papier-mache houses in high corners where the roof and walls met. Do you realize that wasps end each hum with a question mark?
The attic window was not important for what I could see outside. It was indispensable to my activities inside. For, under the windowsill, illuminated by this small rectangle of daylight, was a large chest, and in that chest was the fuel for wonderful imaginings. There were beaded, dainty handbags, lined with silk so brittle with age that a clumsy child’s hand would shred it. What family coquette had peeped over the rim of the faded Chinese fan—and who had chosen it, and where? Gold-rimmed eyeglasses—so tiny, who could have worn them? They were in a hinged, stiff black leatherette case, lined in rich blue velvet. It pinched my fingers when it snapped shut. There were long cotton dresses, tucked and embroidered. Had they ever been white? Who had laundered them and, most of all, who had stood over an ironing board and pressed out the wrinkles with a series of sad-irons, heated on the wood stove?
Every National Geographic since the beginning of time was stacked in the attic. They were never thrown away, and never, never cut up for pictures. The maps, too, were sacred. I loved the National Geographic, but got impatient with the printed parts. The old copies of Life magazine, however, were my window on the world. There was glamour, drama, gritty reality. Every copy was there, right back to the one with Hoover Dam on the cover.
I was not encouraged to spend time in the attic. My grandmother would have much preferred that I play out-of-doors, and get “some roses in my cheeks,” and help feed the chickens, or bring in kindling for the stove. So my attic visits were rare, and when I had settled myself amongst the treasures there I would be very quiet, and listen to the wasps, and smell the wood, and my child’s imagination would visit the whole wide world, lit by one small window with flakes of paint on its sill.

Mar 15, 1993: Family story, by Jacquelin Ewing:
KILLING CHICKENS
Of varieties there were three: Plymouth Rocks, Rhode Island Reds, and White Leghorns. The Plymouth Rocks were my favorites, with their handsome black-and-white barred feathers, puffed and proud, feet of gold, combs of red. Besides, their chicks were coal black and soft as thistle-down. The Rhode Island Reds always looked cross, and the White Leghorns were spare and tall and moved jerkily, with high steps, their yellow eyes full of suspicion.
Those ladies among them mature enough to be titled “laying hens” lived in the east wing of the dairy barn, in nests built over feeding bins and mangers. The nests were nothing more than wooden boxes set on their sides, with straw beds to accommodate the occupants. Egg-gathering was, for a very small girl, an activity fraught with peril, for laying hens did not give up the product of their day’s labor without complaint—they pecked fiercely. So it was not a chore given to me (I was also far too little to reach the hens’ nests, let alone slide my hand under the warm feathers and seek out the warm brown eggs). My grandmother was the egg gatherer. She held out her apron, and, clucking and making hen-soothing noises, she managed to distract the biddies long enough to fill the apron-pouch with eggs and make her getaway.
There were two categories of chicken which made their glorious exits from this life by way of the Sunday dinner table. One, alas, was the laying hen, who, having supplied the breakfast board with eggs for some time, aged beyond her productive years, achieved redundancy in the work force and was tagged for the stewpot. The second group were those young males who were hatched to the fast track—these were the fryers, who experienced but a brief glimpse of life, and would not live to strut and fret upon the poultry stage as did those few self-important roosters who were retained to repopulate the barnyard.
When my granddad brought a hen to the yard for beheading, he held it by the feet, swaying at his side, its wings drooping, head bumping against his khaki work pants. It must have been a position the hen found comfortable, if not mesmerizing, for there was no squawking or struggling or beating of wings.
The place of execution was the side yard, between the kitchen door and the woodshed. It was a tree-stump, dark stains streaking its rutted top surface. A hatchet was, it seemed to me, permanently affixed to one side of the stump—although I am sure that was not the case, for the hatchet was not rusty, its edge was kept shiny and sharp.
The kitchen-yard was my grandmother’s venue, and at its gate she relieved Grandpa of his charge. She had already carried in a bucket of water from the yard pump and set it to boil on the kitchen stove. When the subject chicken was brought into the yard, Grandmother, hatchet in hand, wasted no time. She took the chicken, still by the feet, swung the body up on the stump, and with one swift whack of the hatchet, separated head from neck.
Grandmother stepped back from the killing stump, letting the body of the hen drop to the ground. The expression “running around like a chicken with its head cut off” had its most graphic definition in the next minute or two, for the body of the chicken, having received no contrary message from the head, proceeded, in its way, to elude its executioners as it had failed to do in life, spurting gore into the dusty yard. The flip-flopping and scrambling continued until, at last, some ultimate realization of the futility of it all reached the last muscle and tendon, and the headless torso collapsed in a heap of bloody feathers.
Grandmother brought the hot water out to the yard and poured it into a galvanized tub. Taking the body of the chicken by the feet, she plunged it into the steaming bath, then began plucking feathers, pulling and ripping, and tossing them onto a spread newspaper with her strong hands. When the bird was all but naked, the remaining pin-feathers would be singed off over a flame on the wood-stove, the bird disemboweled (this was called “dressing” although that seemed to me a clear contradiction) and stored in the wooden ice-box for later preparation.
Wouldn’t you think I’d have felt some hesitation over the Sunday drumstick or (my personal favorite) wishbone? Truth to tell, I never to my recollection gave a passing memorial thought to the creature who had travelled, uncomplaining and upside down, to its death on that gory stump. For one thing, I believe all farm-children have a different view of life and death—a necessarily acquired pragmatism. And for another thing, chickens, beyond their fluffy early days, took on, for me another character entirely. If you have ever looked closely at a chicken’s yellow eye, you will see something akin to the eye of a demon. It is the coldest gaze imaginable, and it is easy to understand that chickens practice cannibalism with enthusiasm. Early on, I determined that chickens just weren’t human.

1995: Family story, by Jacquelin Ewing:
THE STOVE
It was a great, looming blunt instrument, king of the kitchen. And like some fierce and hungry god it demanded frequent feeding and gingerly attendance. To its acolytes it dispensed warmth and comfort. It was the great, dark, pulsing heart of the ranch house.
My grandmother arose at five o’clock to start her fires. Wood chunks, kindling and bits of paper ignited, roaring in the cast-iron furnace, as clear a call to be up and about one’s business as any gong or steeple bell.
The wood supply was stacked in fairly haphazard fashion in a shack—a true woodshed—a thing of peeling paint and ill-fitting door. Sometimes I would bring in wood for the next day’s fires, if the weather was fine and I was wearing a sweater with long sleeves (to minimize collection of splinters in my arms)—sent out always with the admonishment “watch out for snakes!”
The stove had places for six pots to cook—they sat on round lids which could be removed with the aid of an iron handle in order to add more wood, should a pot go “off the boil,” as my grandmother would say. Grandmother had large, capable, bony hands, and she was quick with them. She could open the hatches in the stove and shove a fresh chunk of wood right into the glowing coals and leaping flames and escape without a singe. It seemed a miracle, like those I heard about at Sunday School: she was protected even in the fiery furnace!
There was a great oven, capacious enough for a big turkey, some baking potatoes, and a pie or two. When I heard the tale of Hansel and Gretel, I understood exactly how the children shoved the cruel witch into her own oven and turned her into gingerbread — her oven was just about the size of ours: of course there was plenty of room.
This stove was a hard taskmaster: it demanded attention the year around. In summer it was covered with foaming cauldrons of jelly and preserves and huge pots of water boiling the impurities from mason jars and jelly glasses. The temperature outdoors might be well past 100, and my grandmother would be mopping her forehead with her cotton print apron and tucking back damp strands of gray hair which had escaped her ‘Psyche knot,” never missing a phrase as she hummed “Bringing in the Sheaves”, or “Brighten the Comer Where You Are”.
During sheep-shearing season extra men would be hired, meals included in their pay. Bacon, ham, Philadelphia scrapple, baking-powder biscuits cut out with a jelly glass, dozens of eggs “over easy” or “sunny side up,” gallons of coffee, strong and black—they all issued from the roaring beast in an endless procession, to fortify and nourish the sinewy, sun-cured shearers, who would ply their craft for some days, then move on to the next ranch, the next kitchen.
In winter, of course, the big black stove made life bearable there in the chill, stubbly foothills. To its warmth came my grandfather and my uncle, bursting through the kitchen door, pulling off their stiff leather work-gloves and offering their ruddy, chapped hands, rubbing and blowing, and stamping their boots on the worn linoleum floor—exulting in a few minutes of respite from the north wind and the frost.
Very near Christmas is lambing season. The little ones are born in the depths of winter, often during the night, often in the most miserable of weather. They and their mothers must be found quickly at this time when they are at their most vulnerable, and protected from the cold and from coyotes and mountain lions. This is not the only reason they must be located immediately. The occasional mother ewe will not survive lambing, leaving an orphan; other ewes will, unaccountably, refuse to nurse their offspring and drive the babies off.
My grandfather would tenderly collect these outcasts, known as “bummers.” He would bring them to the ranch house, into the kitchen. Their nursery was a large box, lined with flour and feed sacks, which fit handily into the space between the back of the stove and the kitchen wall—an area about twenty inches deep, toasty warm. It was my special job to feed the lambs—warm milk from a ketchup bottle with a long black rubber nipple.
It was an important assignment: often a surrogate mother could not be found for perhaps a week or more. One baby remained a pet, and grew to adolescence in or near the ranch house. I named her Bouncing Betsy.
The baby lambs, to me, were a more significant part of the winter season—almost—than Christmas. I knew exquisite joy, crouching on the kitchen floor hugging the wriggling, woolly, knobbly lambs, while the aroma of cinnamon rolls—spicy, yeasty—curled up from the great oven, and Grandmother shook a pan of popping corn on top of the big black stove.

1995: Family story, by Jacquelin Ewing:
(an excerpt from): SATURDAYS, SUNDAYS, AND SIN
My grandmother Jacquelin Chatfield Mallon (known in later years as “Nana”) embraced, in her early adulthood, a plain-spoken Evangelical Fundamentalism. Within its canon, the Bible was accepted quite literally as God’s word, every word true. The blueprint for one’s life was to be found in its pages, all questions regarding deportment between its covers.
A lot of the rules of behavior were spelled out pretty clearly, and those I understood. On the Sabbath (Sunday, in our case), one did not visit any commercial establishment, because, other than the tithe placed in the church collection-plate, money was not to change hands. Aside from last-minute preparations, such as chicken-frying, Sunday dinner was prepared on Saturday. Other than the most basic chores, there was no ranch work done which could be put off until Monday. (Of course, if one’s ox fell into a ditch, it would not have been considered good form to leave it until Monday—this was a given.) Sunday was to be a day of rest—as much rest as was possible to find on a hardscrabble sheep ranch in the ungraceful valley foothills.

**********
Mallon Family Line

George Washington Mallon
Son of Thomas O’Meallain & Elizabeth Turner
Occupation: Farmer
Born: Dec 1850, Butler, Bates Co., Missouri
Died: Feb 16, 1936 (age 84-85), Salina, Saline Co., Kansas
Buried: Franklin Cemetery in Tescott, Ottawa Co., Kansas
Married: Dec 12, 1872, Mary Ann Thompson, Bates Co., Missouri
Twelve children

Mary Ann Thompson
Born: Oct 1856, Canada
Died: Oct 26, 1928 (age 71-72 ), Salina, Saline Co., Kansas
Buried: Franklin Cemetery in Tescott, Ottawa Co., Kansas
Married: Dec 12, 1872, George Washington Mallon, Bates Co., Missouri
Twelve children:

1. James Frederick Mallon
1873 – 1944 (m. Jacquelin Chatfield)
2. Ruth Jane Mallon
1874 – 1919 (m. Chris Nelson)
3. Katherine Pauline “Katie” Mallon
1876 – 1962 (m. Elfes T. Martin)
4. Charlotte Mallon
1878 – 1879
5. George Edward Mallon
1879 – 1946 (m. Kathryn Ford)
6. Seth Monroe Mallon
1881 – 1954 (m. Pink Bell)
7. Milton H. Mallon
1883 – 1883
8. Mary Malinda Mallon
1884 – 1973 (m. Roy James Giersch)
9. Sylvia Sinda Mallon
1886 – 1960 (m. Walter Highland Fairchild, Charles H. Lord)
10. Vina E. Mallon
1888 – 1918 (m. Rubbie R. Richards)
11. Francis Marian Mallon (male)
1892 – 1970 (m. Doris E. Constable)
12. Ida Ann Mallon
1894 – 1987 (m. William Roscoe French)

2020. Catherine (Clemens) Sevenau.