Merced County CA Archives Biographies.....Luiz, Mauel 
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Joy Fisher sdgenweb@yahoo.com February 13, 2006, 3:58 am

Author: John Outcalt (1925)

MANUEL LUIZ

   The Azores Islands lie in almost a direct line from Portugal to the capital
of the United States, and from them come many of our best citizens, some to make
money and remain loyal to the Stars and Stripes, others to make money and return
to their native shores to spend the balance of their days in comfort among those
they know best. One of the latter was Domingo Antone Noya, a native of Ponta Del
Gada, who left his home at the age of fifteen and, after having sailed around
the world, landed in California and made his fortune, then returned to his
native land, married and settled down to farm and political life at Ponta Del
Gada, and there he died at the age of sixty-two years. His good wife was Anna
Margarida da Conceicao, and they had four children, three daughters, who are
still in the Azores, and Manuel, our subject.

   Manuel was reared on his father's farm and attended the local school until he
was old enough to make his own way. It was but natural that he should want to
come to California where his father had made his stake, for he had told his son
of the wonderful opportunities that awaited the ambitious young men. When
seventeen he left home and boarded the three-masted ship Sarah and twenty-four
days later was landed in Boston. He did not tarry there for within two days he
was en route for California, arriving there ten days later via New Orleans.
Being a stranger in a strange land did not stop him from securing work in the
cherry harvest at $1.25 per day; from that work he was employed on a ranch at
twenty dollars per month, working from sun to sun, continuing so employed until
1898, when he visited the land of his birth and was absent for five months.
Returning to California he located in Merced County and worked for Al. Owens
near Atwater. In the meantime, in 1898, he had invested his savings in thirty
acres of land in the Mitchell Colony near Atwater, and while he was developing
this he worked on the Bloss ranch as foreman of the gang setting out trees of
peaches and apricots, for nine years. Then he located on his own property and
has since given his time to its intensive cultivation. Mr. Luiz was given his
naturalization papers in San Francisco in 1896, and at the time he signed them
he dropped the name Noya and wrote it Manuel Luiz, the latter being his middle
name, and as such he has ever since been known. His father had received his
citizenship papers before returning to Flores.

   On November 18, 1909, at St. Mary's in Stockton, Manuel Luiz was united in
marriage with Miss Mary Josephine Vieira, born in Swansea, Mass. She was the
second of five children born to her parents, Manuel V. and Mary (Soares) Vieira,
the father born in Flores and the mother in Pico Island. The latter is now
deceased but the father is living and resides on the ranch with his daughter and
Mr. Luiz.

   Manuel Vieira was born in 1859, was educated in the Portuguese schools and is
a fluent linguist in Portuguese and English. He came to Boston a young man of
seventeen on a sailing vessel, being thirty days on the water. The ship ran out
of food and there was almost mutiny on the high seas, when the Bermuda Islands
were sighted and there they landed and restocked for the rest of the voyage. He
worked as a weaver in Massachusetts for five years, then returned to Flores, but
remained only a short time, when he again came to America and straight on to
California. He spent some time in Modesto as a barber in 1883. He was married in
Oakland to Mary Soares, returned to Swansea, Mass., where two children were
born, Alfred J., and Mary. With his family he made another trip back to the
Azores to make a visit, but upon coming back to America he made for California
and settled in Sebastopol, where two children were born, Palmyra Tahoe, Mrs. H.
L. Wrheman, and Ernest. His wife died there and he came to Oakland and ran a
grocery store, then for seventeen years he was with the State Harbor Commission
in San Francisco, when he retired to make his home with his daughter. In 1925 he
started on another trip back to his native country and a tour of Europe. He is
an interesting storyteller and it is expected that upon his return he will have
many new stories to tell his grandchildren.

   Mr. and Mrs. Luiz have four children: Mary C, born February 17, 1913; Anna
Aileen, born December 23, 1915; Ernest D., born April 29, 1917; and Elaine M.,
born July 8, 1918. These children are attending the Atwater school. Mrs. Luiz is
a great reader and is much interested in education, being a past vice-president
of the Atwater Parent-Teachers Association, and served on the Ways and Means
Committee in 1923. She served as the treasurer of the U. P. P. E. C. society for
some time. Mr. Luiz is secretary of the U. P. E. C, of which he has been a
member for over fifteen years. He is the president of the Atwater Pentacost Club
Association, which he helped to organize. He is a Republican in politics. Both
Mr. and Mrs. Luiz are stockholders in the California Peach and Apricot
Association and their thirty acres is in a highly developed condition, with
trees from five to seventeen years old. They are liberal-minded and cooperate in
all movements for the betterment of the community.


Additional Comments:
From:

HISTORY OF
MERCED COUNTY
CALIFORNIA
WITH A
Biographical Review
OF
The Leading Men and Women of the County Who Have Been
Identified with Its Growth and Development
from the Early Days to the Present

HISTORY BY
JOHN OUTCALT

ILLUSTRATED COMPLETE IN ONE VOLUME
HISTORIC RECORD COMPANY
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA
1925


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