Before wheat, there were the Yokuts people who lived along the river. They would build rafts to float to the great Tulare Lake during flood time, to fish and hunt for geese and ducks in preparation for the winter. They lived off the land and were good caretakers of the environment.
Back in 1976, the year our nation celebrated its bicentennial, we looked around locally and realized that many of Reedley’s historic building landmarks had slipped away.
Gone was the headquarters ranch house of the town’s namesake, T.L. Reed, along with the bunkhouse and barn that once housed harness and tack for hundreds of draft animals needed for a farm operation of close to 30,000 acres. These buildings were demolished in the name of progress--to make way for the expansion of Reedley College.
Early in the 1900s, C.L. Drath, who lived in Los Angeles at the time, traveled north in search of a suitable place to raise his family. On his return trip to L.A., he stopped in Reedley to visit friends and was so taken with the river, the mountains, the community, and the Methodist Episcopal Church, that he picked Reedley as his new home. There were four new homes being built on D Street, and Drath chose the one on the three lot parcel (75'). This house was larger than the others, although they all had the same floor plan.
Before the year 1892, Reedley awakened to activity on G Street where today we enjoy Pioneer Park. Chinese laborers were building brick kilns for the Craycroft Brick Company. These kilns would fire bricks that would be used to build two warehouses commissioned by the Granger's Bank of California, located in San Francisco.
It was a cold and windy, West Texas thunderstorm that was pounding Amherst's brand-new South Plains Farmer's Co-Op Hospital when Howard Bulls joined the ranks of fatherhood. He was well aware that this honor could be short-lived: my mother had been hospitalized since the first day of March, battling toxemia. I arrived at two pounds, and with no incubator available, Dr. McDonald gave me a life expectancy of three days. Using the technology of a chicken brooder, the janitor rigged up a tent and a heat lamp over my crib.
Last time I left you, we were cruizin' Reedley and eating cheeseburgers in 1960, as well as checking out the gas stations and bulk plants. But, you might ask, how did kids afford cars way back then, not to mention gas, insurance and cheeseburgers? We'll get to that, after a little history.
The last time we slid back in time it was to 1950 and I was pedaling around town on my J.C. Higgins 'Hiawatha' bike, checking out the auto dealerships around Reedley. Today we are going to slide back to 1958, while "cruizin" in my 1940 Ford Coupe.
The start of the 1920s finds Drake Manufacturing moving to their new location at East and South Avenues (now Dinuba Ave.). Having perfected the Jadson Motor Valve, Drake closed the garage and Buick agency to devote all their efforts toward the valve business. The Drake Family still finds time for racing and a new hobby: barnstorming. In fact, on the roof of the new building "Jadson Motor Valve Company" is painted for anyone passing or flying by to see. 1920 was bittersweet for the Drake Family however, as family patriarch John Alexander passes away.
America may have been a late comer to the industrial revolution, but the country had the advantage of possessing the raw materials needed to excel in manufacturing. The only thing imported was cheap labor. The industrialization of transportation began with the "horseless carriage." These vehicles were propelled by three types power.
It's a challenge not to be repetitious while writing for Kings River Life--in many of the stories I have written before, it is inevitable that Reedley's history will come up. It is also astonishing to realize that the lifetime I have spent in Reedley spans over half of the City's existence! That's right, not just the centennial, not even the incorporation, but since the very inception of a town named Reedley (by one year) in 1888.
