Daniel Donaldson Adams (5/19/1878 – 6/16/1953) was born in Bexar County, Texas to John Quincy and Sarah (Haw) Adams. John Quincy was 58 years old when Daniel was born and Sarah was a second wife, nineteen years his junior.
John Q. Adams was a widower living in Tennessee at the turn of the century, but Daniel had come to southern California as a boy, possibly living with one of two uncles in the area. Peter T. Adams was a prominent grower and businessman in Tustin and Martin V. Adams was a citrus grower in the city of Orange. In 1892 14-year-old Daniel was in the Tustin Boys Brigade and six years later he served as a private in Company L, 7th California regiment during the Spanish-American War.
Daniel returned from his service and on August 22, 1900, married Vernie Pearl Herrick (3/15/1881-5/29/1948) in Tustin. Daniel was twenty-two and his bride nineteen. Pearl was a native of Minnesota who had lived with her family in Kansas before coming to California in the late 1890s. She was living in Orange with her parents Seth and Elizabeth Elma Herrick at the time of her marriage to Daniel.
Daniel and Pearl lived for a time in Tustin where they ran a grocery store. They spent a short time farming near Los Angeles before returning to Tustin. They had been married for sixteen years before their first child was born, a son Robert, in 1916. He was followed in 1918 by a daughter, Lauris. Daniel became an officer in the Orange County Department of the California Highway Patrol in 1927, remaining with the force until his retirement in 1943. Pearl Adams passed away at the age of 67 and was buried at Fairhaven Memorial Park in Santa Ana.
Daniel remarried and moved to Costa Mesa after having lived in Tustin for sixty years. He was living with his new wife Leola on Newport Blvd. in Costa Mesa when he died, at Hoag Memorial Hospital in Newport Beach at the age of 75. He was buried at Fairhaven Memorial Park in Santa Ana with a military headstone denoting his service in the Spanish-American War.
Both children of Daniel and Pearl (Herrick) Adams were born in Los Angeles.
Robert Daniel Adams (2/21/1916)-12/8/1948) graduated from Tustin High School in 1934 and went on to attend Santa Ana Junior College. On June 29, 1941, he married Elizabeth Jane Dodge in Costa Mesa. Elizabeth was the daughter of Judge and Mrs. Donald Dodge. At the time of the wedding Bob was working for the Treesweet Products Company. Eventually the marriage would end in divorce.
Bob enlisted in the Army Air Corps on March 17, 1943, rising to the rank of sergeant. He was stationed in England, France, Belgium and Germany, serving with the 3rd Air Force Clearing Station, 40th Field Hospital and with the 9th Air Force as a personnel clerk. He earned four battle stars for his service in the war and was discharged in December 1945.
Tragically, 32-year-old Robert D. Adams was killed in a fiery one car crash when his jeep struck a bridge on a road about 30 miles east of El Paso, Texas. His body was badly burned, and he was identified only by the license plate on the jeep. His body was returned to Orange County, and he was buried at Fairhaven Memorial Park in Santa Ana.
Lauris Jean Adams (2/23/1918 – 7/27/2003) attended Tustin schools, graduating from Tustin High School in 1936. On Christmas Eve 1940 she married Lowell Alvin Dart (7/9/1918-9/12/1999) in Tustin. Lowell, born in Santa Ana was the son of Orval “Ted” and Helen Gertrude Dart. In the early years of their marriage, Lauris and Lowell lived on B Street in Tustin and Lowell worked with his father, moving houses that were threatened by the growth of the area. The homes were cleared away to make room for new roads and eventually, the freeways.
By 1950 Lauris and Lowell had moved to Riverside, California where Lowell worked as a carpenter and Lauris cared for their children; Marlene, Daniel and Barbara Jean. Lowell Alvin Dart died at the age of 81. Lauris Jean (Adams) Dart passed away at the age of 85 and was buried beside her husband at Crestlawn Memorial Park in Riverside, California.
See Museum file for the sources of this Family Profile
Researched by Timothy Zierer
Created: 7/23/2020
