Columbia County OR Archives Biographies.....Dibblee, Harold Rupert August 6, 1871 - ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/or/orfiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Ila Wakley iwakley@msn.com October 24, 2009, 3:38 pm Source: History of the Columbia River Valley From The Dalles to the Sea, Vol. III, Published 1928, Pages 102-104 Author: The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company HAROLD R. DIBBLEE is one of Columbia county's most successful farmers, whose well improved and productive ranch lies near Ranier, of which locality he has been a lifelong resident and where he is held in high esteem by all who know him. He was born at Ranier on the 6th of August, 1871, and is a son of John and Sarah (Weston) Dibblee, the former dying in July, 1910, while the latter is still living in Rainier and was ninety-two years old, January 20, 1928. In the Oregon Daily Journal of April 10, 1926, Fred Lockley printed the following account of a visit which he made to Rainier, during which he gained much interesting information regarding one of Oregon's early Masonic lodges and an old pioneer who was once its worshipful master and whose family history was sketched by Mr. Dibblee's mother: "While at Rainier recently I went with N. N. Blumensaadt, secretary of the Rainier Masonic lodge, through the beautiful lodge rooms. He showed me the charter of the lodge, made out at Astoria by the grand lodge when Oregon was a territory. At that time Benjamin Starke was grand master, Amory Holbrook, deputy grand master, Avery A. Smith, senior grand warden, and Stephen F. Chadwick, later governor of Oregon, junior grand warden. The grand lodge appointed William Strong master, George Barlow senior warden and W. R. Strong junior warden of Rainier lodge. The charter was issued at Astoria on July 16, 1858, and was signed by Ralph Wilcox, grand treasurer, and C. J. Trenchard, grand secretary. " 'William S. Ladd, who started his career in Oregon here at Rainier, sent two Italian fresco painters down here to paint the decorations on our ceilings and the paintings back of the various stations,' said Mr. Blumensaadt. 'Dean Blanchard, worshipful master of the lodge, paid for most of the lodge furnishings and we have his library. His sister, who is ninety years old, still lives here in Rainier. I will take you down to see her.' " 'Yes, this is a comfortable old house,' said Mrs. Sarah Weston Blanchard Dibblee, Mr. Blanchard's sister, when I visited her. 'I have lived here since 1869. Do you see the picture of that old house on the wall? We call that the "new house." It was our home in Maine and was built in 1718. My mother, Eunice Weston, was born in that house, August 29, 1804. John Weston, an ancestor of my mother's, landed at Salem, Massachusetts, in 1644. My father's people, the Blanchards, had come to Massachusetts a few years before. Thomas Blanchard, one of our ancestors, was born at Weymouth in 1693. My father, Merrill Blanchard, was born at North Abingdon, Massachusetts, in July, 1806. My mother died November 7, 1841, at the age of thirty-seven years, leaving six children. My father then married Lucy Paul and to them were born six more children. I was born at Madison, Maine, January 20, 1836. My father was a fine singer and a natural-born hotelkeeper. I went as a girl to Houlton Academy, at Houlton, Maine. The town of Houlton, near St. Helens, Oregon, is named for Houlton, Maine. When I was sixteen I started teaching, receiving the prevailing wage, two dollars a week. After two or three years I was raised to three dollars a week. We used to live up near the line between Maine and New Brunswick. We "Yankees" used to cross the line into New Brunswick, and the "Bluenoses" from New Brunswick would come across and visit us. My husband, John Dibblee, was a "Bluenose." His great-grandfather was rector of the Episcopal church at Stamford, Connecticut, more than fifty years. His grandfather was a rector in Nova Scotia. His father was an Episcopal clergyman in New Brunswick. " 'My husband and I were married at Woodstock, New Brunswick, November 13, 1862. In 1864 we went to Dutch Flat, Placer county, California, where my brother, Nathan Weston Blanchard, was running a sawmill. My husband worked in the sawmill and I taught school at Dutch Flat. They paid me fifty dollars a month for four hours' work a day. I taught there five terms. In 1869 we came to Rainier. My husband came up to work for my brother, Dean Blanchard, who had come to Oregon in 1854. Dean left Maine for the West expecting to return later and marry his sweetheart, but she didn't wait for him, so Dean never married. My husband bought the Charlie North donation land claim of three hundred and twenty acres, also the Dobbins half-section, and some other property, till he owned twelve hundred acres here. Two of my children are still living. My son, H. R., runs our old ranch, and my daughter Edith married A. L. Clark, postmaster at Rainier. " 'When I came to Rainier, fifty-seven years ago, my brother Dean had a store here and there were but six houses. He was born December 20, 1832. He came to Oregon by way of Nicaragua. He took passage aboard the steamer "Northern Light." In the early '50s he worked for the government and was assistant wagonmaster of a government expedition to Boise. In 1857 he became auditor of Columbia county and the following year was appointed Columbia county's first county clerk. He started his sawmill at Rainier in 1863. In 1864 he was made postmaster of Rainier, and in 1874 became county judge. He also ran a piledriver and a general merchandise store, owned a steamboat and did towing. He was also mayor of Rainier. "'My sister Mary was born December 26, 1839. She married John Leary at Littleton, Maine, November 26, 1858. They moved to Seattle in 1869 and became well-to-do. Mr. Leary, after my sister's death, married Elizabeth Ferry, a daughter of Governor Elisha Ferry. My brother Nathan Weston Blanchard was born July 24, 1831, in Maine, and after graduating from Houlton Academy went to California. He mined in the placer diggings at Iowa Hill in 1855 and later at Dutch Flat, in Placer county. In 1872 he built a flour mill and also laid out the town of Santa Paula. He was district collector of Placer county in 1861 and 1862 and was in the California Assembly in 1862 and 1863. He was one of the first to raise lemons on an extensive scale in California. "'My mother's sister married Amasa Bixby. Their son Jotham was born at Norridgewock, Maine, went to California in 1852, mined about five years, and in 1856 took up sheepraising in San Luis Obispo county. He bought twenty-seven thousand acres in southern California at twenty cents an acre for a sheep range. Later he bought twenty-six thousand acres more. The town of Long Beach is located in his sheep pasture. At one time he ran thirty thousand head of sheep and his wool clip was more than two hundred thousand pounds a year. He married Margaret Winslow Hathaway, daughter of Rev. George Hathaway, of Skowhegan, Maine. They were married December 4, 1862, at San Juan Bautista, in California. They have a beautiful home on Ocean Avenue, at Long Beach. In 1886 I went back to Maine to attend a family reunion, at which more than four hundred of our relatives were present.' " Harold R. Bibblee received his elementary education in the district school at Rainier, after which he took a course in a business college in Portland. He then returned to the home ranch, to the operation of which he has devoted his attention continuously since. He has carried on diversified farming, in addition to which he has given much attention to raising cattle, specializing for many years in high-grade shorthorn beef cattle. About ten years ago he changed to dairy cattle, and now has a splendid herd of about forty-five head of good milch cows. He separates the milk, selling the cream to the creamery at Rainier, and also sells some of his milk wholesale. The farm comprises five hundred and sixty acres of rich bottom land, on which are produced abundant crops of potatoes, hay and silage, and Mr. Dibblee also owns eighty acres of higher land, which is leased. The river bottom land is protected by a dyke from high-water overflow from the Columbia river. It is well improved and is regarded as one of the most valuable farms in this section of the county. On December 18, 1898, Mr. Dibblee was united in marriage to Miss Anna Belle Perry, who was born in Minnieska, Minnesota, and is a daughter of Wellington M. and Victoria Augusta (Parrott) Perry, both of whom were natives of New York state, the mother having been born near the city of Elmira. Both were school teachers and after coming to Oregon, in 1889, taught school for several years. Mr. Perry later went to Alberta, Canada, where he took up land, but subsequently returned to Oregon, where his death occurred August 23, 1915. His widow is now living in Rainier. They were the parents of four children, namely: Mrs. Dibblee; Luther M., of Portland, Oregon; Mrs. Alice Wood, of Rainier, and Mrs. Lois C. Barnett, of St. Helens, Oregon. Mr. and Mrs. Dibblee have four children: Lois Weston, who graduated from the State Normal School at Monmouth, after which she taught school for four years, is the wife of A. V. Kent, of Rainier; Kenneth Rupert, who graduated from Oregon Agricultural College in civil engineering, is a member of the Masonic order; Alice Izelle, who graduated from the State Normal School at Monmouth, is now teaching in local public affairs, having served as a member of the Water Commission at Rainier. Mr. Dibblee is a member of Rainier Lodge, No. 24, A. F. & A. M., and has been active in local public affairs, having served as a member of the Water Commission at Rainier. Mrs. Dibblee and her two daughters are members of the Order of the Eastern Star. Mr. Dibblee has in every respect proven a good citizen in the highest sense of the term, has stood consistently for those things which tend to promote the public welfare, and commands the uniform confidence and respect of his fellowmen. File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/or/columbia/bios/dibblee906gbs.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/orfiles/ File size: 10.5 Kb