Story by Jon Stalnaker AKA The Studebaker Dude
Earlier this week, Sapulpa Times Publisher Micah Choquette emailed me about about a finding in his own family history he thought I’d be interested in. It was such a fascinating find that I’m sharing it here with you, almost verbatim:
Hey Jon, I found a bit of my own family history you might find interesting. My great-grandpa Jim Fanning wrote a short book about his life before he passed away, and I just recently re-read it after not having it for years and saw a part where he and wife Marie and their family lived in California for a while. Grandpa was an army veteran and a rodeo cowboy … here’s an excerpt featuring some towns you might recognize:
“The first paper we got had an opening for a ranch foreman with experience. We were really excited as we drove to the ranch to apply for the job. We hadn’t learned that two acres in California could be a ranch, so we were told they needed a foreman for a two-acre orange patch, which I had never seen on a tree. We finally got a job in Knights Ferry, California from an Italian Ranchero. He had five cowboys and a veterinarian working on his ranch. After we had been there two months he fired all the other men. Marie tended to the milk cows. She had about 20 calves to feed from daylight until dark. He had 600 steers that I doctored and drove from pasture to pasture. We shipped cattle to the Stockton Cattle Sales Yard. I got acquainted with the owners. I thought it would be helpful later.
“We were working seven days a week. After thirteen months we took off one day. When it was deducted from my pay, we quit and moved closer to Stockton. We lived in Escalon where our next daughter was born. I was promoted to cattle buyer for the company. I had auctioned a few sales. I sold sheep in Dixon for about three months, a job I sure didn’t like. One day a dairy farmer came to the yard to deliver a big bull. Several stock hands had tried to unload the bull. They tried everything with no success. The foremen asked me to unload the bull; he was sure I would unload him. I rode my horse up to the truck and looked the situation over. I roped the bull by the horns; I tied the rope to the gate post and told the driver to drive his truck out. He did. The Bull hit the ground. The boss said he would have to fire me. I never did know how they got the rope off of the bull.”
My reply to Micah:
I was born and raised in Stockton and if we wanted to head for the hills to Lake Tahoe or Yosemite National Park, we would drive through Escalon and Oakdale to get there. They were big-time cowboy towns with the rodeo being the big attraction in Oakdale. Just past Oakdale was Knights Ferry. Knights Ferry was a tiny town with its big draw, the longest covered bridge west of the Mississippi. I knew about it and always meant to turn down that road to check it out. I finally got to see it when my sister Viki passed away and we had her celebration of life there.
I began my postal career in Stockton. Stockton was the sectional center for a big portion of central California and handled the mail for all cities with the 952 and 953 zip codes. Escalon (95320) was one of them. I once applied for the postmaster job there but withdrew my application when I learned that a friend of mine also applied for that job. He was the son of the postmaster who retired, creating the vacancy. I was delighted when they chose him for that position. I trained this young man when he was first hired as a letter carrier in Stockton. He had a presence when he first walked into the training room, and I knew instantaneously that he would be a manager one day. I also trained him when he did get into management, which was not very many years later.
I did a karaoke show in Escalon when I was moonlighting as a DJ. It was a country western bar and luckily I knew just enough country music to keep from getting beat up in the parking lot after the gig. My daughter Jillian, that lives near Bristow, graduated from high school in Oakdale and that’s where she met her husband Tim. I picked up my daughter Jillian back then for a weekend visit and she pointed out the gas station that Tim was working at. I pulled in and asked him to put a penny’s worth of gas in the tank. Yes, that was during the time that you could still shut off the hose that fast (even in California) … BTW, Tim also used to live in Kellyville before he moved to California.
I eventually got the job of postmaster of Dixon California, and I think you already knew that. Dixon is a great town and home of the biggest sheep processing plant west of the Mississippi. I moved to that town for the postmaster job and figured it would be my hometown for the rest of my life. The Fanning family currently owns Bud’s Pub and Grill, a popular bar and eatery in downtown Dixon. I wonder if they are distant relatives of yours. Dixon was my home for 25 years, 10 as the postmaster, and 15 more until Oklahoma stole me away.
Thanks for sending this to me. You were right when you figured I might recognize some of the towns that were mentioned. I actually recognized all of them, along with the Fanning name and two best “west of the Mississippi” locations. Thanks for the trip down memory lane, I hope you enjoyed the ride.
