Los Angeles County CA Archives Biographies.....Van Tress, Benjamin F. 1836 - 
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Author: Luther A. Ingersoll (1908)

    BENJAMIN F. VAN TRESS is one of the early day pioneers of Los Angeles. He
came to California in 1859. He is a native of Clinton County, Ohio, and was born
near Wilmington, the county seat, December 26th, 1836.

    His father, William, was a carpenter by trade, a farmer by occupation, of
Dutch descent. His mother, Melissa Hollister, and his father were both natives
of New York and lived in the Mohawk Valley. The father was twice married, the
subject of this sketch being one of two sons by first marriage. The other son,
Charles, came to California in 1897, and went to Alaska where he died.

    Benjamin lived in his native county until 1854 and with the family removed
to Warren County, Indiana, where he took up carpenter work. He later joined the
gold rush to Pikes Peak, proceeded west to Nebraska City, Nebraska, and
abandoned the trip. He there joined an overland party bound for California, and
drove a four horse team via north Platte to Salt Lake, thence via southern route
to San Bernardino with Joseph Meeks, and arrived at his destination in 1859. He
spent two weeks there and then came to Los Angeles. Here he followed his trade
for about seven years, doing a large amount of work for Bishop Mora. He worked
on the building of the present Catholic Cathedral; was one of the workmen who
remodeled the Church of Our Lady of the Angeles, fronting the old Plaza. He
personally laid out the work for the present "hip roof" and designed the old
belfry that in 1904 gave place to the present mission arches. He describes the
original building as having a flat roof with a slightly receding pitch to the
rear, which was covered with asphaltum and soil mixed. He states that the bells
were originally in small adobe arches so near the ground that a person of
average height could reach the clappers and ring them. There was one bell hung
in an arch, which surmounted the front wall of the building over the main front
entrance.

    Later Mr. Van Tress kept a meat market opposite the northwest corner of the
old plaza.

    He married in 1863, Falipe Mendes, a daughter of Pedro Mendes, a
manufacturer of Spanish saddles, bridles, bits and spurs. He was an expert in
his line of work. Mr. and Mrs. Van Tress have seven living children —Elizabeth,
Mrs. Frederick Bickerdike; Ida, Mrs. J. R. Kull Franklin; Clara, Mrs. George
Hall; William; Alice, Mrs. Allen Orr, and Charles.

    The family home is Twentieth Street, near Pennsylvania Avenue, Santa Monica.


Additional Comments:
Extracted from:

Ingersoll's century history, Santa Monica Bay cities: prefaced with a brief
history of the state of California, a condensed history of Los Angeles County,
1542 to 1908: supplemented with an encyclopedia of local biography and
embellished with views of historic landmarks and portraits of representative
people.

Los Angeles: Luther A. Ingersoll (1908)


File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/ca/losangeles/bios/vantress189bs.txt

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