Born and raised in Missouri, William D. Bowman brought his wife and family to Tustin from Kansas in 1881. For years Bowman and his sons would be well known and prosperous businessmen and farmers in the area.
William Doniphan Bowman (2/17/1846-6/15/1925) was born in Platte, Andrew County, Missouri. He was the fourth of Casper Bowman (1802-1889) and Mary Ann Hutchinson’s (1811-1889) seven children. Casper and Mary Ann were married in their native Kentucky in 1830 but moved their family to Missouri in 1840. Land records show Bowman purchasing acreage in Andrew County in 1846, the year of William’s birth. Casper worked as a stonemason to supplement his farming income. He and Mary Ann remained in Andrew County for the rest of their lives.
William D Bowman grew up in Missouri and was a teenager in the turbulent years of the Civil War. Missouri was a slaveholding border state that remained in the Union but was wracked by partisan violence, especially western Missouri, the location of Andrew County. Neighbor fought neighbor and guerrilla bands led by men like William Quantrill and “Bloody Bill” Anderson roamed the area, murdering Union sympathizers.
It is not known which side the Bowmans supported, but William’s staunch support of the Republican Party in later years would lead one to believe the family favored the Union cause. Unfortunately, the violence in western Missouri continued for years after the war ended.
William D. Bowman married Jeanette Ellen “Ella” Galloway on January 17, 1869, in Savannah, Andrew County, Missouri. The wedding took place at the home of Ella’s father. The wedding guests and the Methodist minister arrived on horseback, fording a nearby swollen stream with some difficulty.
Around 1871 William and Ella, with their infant sons Edgar and Charles, moved to Wellington, Sumner County, Kansas. They farmed in Kansas for ten years but were not able to achieve financial security due to continual droughts and grasshopper plagues. The couple had three more children while living in Kansas, Olive, Homer, and Melville.
Discouraged by his lack of success, Bowman and family left Kansas and moved west, arriving in Tustin on the night of September 28, 1881. Bowman went on to find the financial security he sought, and he and Ella never left Tustin. Their last child, William H. Bowman, was born in Tustin in 1888.
William D. & Ella (Galloway) Bowman
Bowman’s first six years in Tustin were spent working on a raisin ranch owned by Hiram K. Snow. He then set out on his own, purchasing a ranch on Newport Avenue and McFadden Street. He grew apricots, walnuts oranges and eventually would own 20 acres in Tustin as well as farming other acreage he leased in the area.
Bowman spent many years on Newport Road before moving to a ranch on what is now Redhill Avenue north of Irvine Boulevard sometime just after the turn of the century. He continued his agricultural pursuits before retiring from ranch life in 1916. He and Ella had been longtime members of the Advent Christian Church in Tustin and William was known as a staunch Republican. Following his retirement, he and Ella moved into town, living in a new bungalow his son Will built on First Street just west of A Street.
William and Ella celebrated their Golden Wedding Anniversary in January 1919 with a large gathering of family and friends in Tustin at the home of their son Charles. The following year, on September 6, 1920, Ella Bowman passed away at the age of 67. Five years later, William D. Bowman died at his home in Tustin at the age of 79 and was buried beside Ella at Fairhaven Memorial Park in Santa Ana.
The Bowman family in 1917
Front: Melville, W.D., Ella, Olive Back: Homer, Edgar, Charles, William H.
The oldest child of William and Ella Bowman, Edgar Lewis Bowman (10/25/1869-3/2/1945) was born in Andrew County, Missouri. Edgar was eleven years old when his parents moved the family to Tustin. On Christmas Day 1902 Edgar married Anna Louise Carpenter in Pasadena at the home of her parents, Charles and Nettie Carpenter. Four years later the couple moved to South Pasadena where Edgar and Anna owned and operated a photography studio. (Ellen had studied portrait photography before marrying Edgar). The couple had no children and lived on Brent Avenue in South Pasadena, which is where Edgar died at the age of 75. Ellen died in the home on Brent Avenue on August 24, 1959, at the age of 84 and was buried beside her husband at Forest Lawn Cemetery in Glendale, California.
For details on the life of William and Ella Bowman’s second child, Charles Emerson Bowman, see the separate biographical profile.
The third child, and only daughter of William and Ella Bowman was Olive E. Bowman,(10/13/1872-5/10/1942) was born in Wellington, Kansas. Olive was eight years old when the family moved to Tustin. Olive never married and remained at home with her parents well into adulthood. Census records and city directories show her with no occupation so it can be assumed she helped her mother with the housekeeping. After the death of her parents Olive moved to Los Angeles and lived in a boarding house and supported herself working as a seamstress. Sadly, at some point prior to 1935 she was committed to Pacific Colony State Home for the Feebleminded in Los Angeles. She was an inmate of the institute when she died at the age of 69. She was buried near her parents at Fairhaven Memorial Park in Santa Ana.
Homer Bowman (12/25/1876-12/13/1933) was the fourth child of William and Ella. He was born in Wellington, Kansas. He was four years old when the Bowmans moved to Tustin. On December 22, 1898, he married Myrtle O’Hara in Tustin. Myrtle gave birth to a daughter, Jeanette Myrtle Bowman, on January 15, 1901. The couple rented a home in Tustin and Homer worked at an orange packing house. Sadly, Myrtle died on August 12, 1902, at the age of 26 and was buried at Santa Ana Cemetery. On June 1,1908 Homer remarried. His new bride was Mabelle Holland, a widow with a 10-year-old son, Lauren. Her husband, Frank Holland had died in 1906. Homer and Mabelle were married at her mother’s house in Boyle Heights, with many of the Tustin Bowmans attending.
The couple stayed in Los Angeles where Homer worked as a manager for the Sparr Fruit Company. Homer’s daughter Jeanette Myrtle lived with her Bowman grandparents in Tustin. Homer Bowman died at his home near Downey, California just twelve days shy of his 57th birthday. He was buried in Evergreen Cemetery in Los Angeles. Mabelle Bowman survived her husband by almost forty years, passing away on September 9, 1970, at the age of 94.
Homer’s only child, Jeanette Myrtle Bowman married Horace L. Shafer in Los Angeles on December 5, 1917. She was just 16 years old at the time of her wedding. She and Horace had two sons, Port and Clyde. They eventually divorced and by 1930 Jeanette married to World War I veteran George Rossi. Rossi died in 1966, and Jeanette Myrtle (Bowman) Rossi passed away on December 14, 1997, at the age of 96 and is buried with her second husband at Golden Gate National Cemetery in San Bruno, California.
Melville Cecil Bowman (6/7/1877-12/25/1944) was born in Wellington, Kansas and was just four years old when his parents moved the family to Tustin. He grew up attending Tustin schools and lived at home until marrying at the age of 38. His bride was 40-year-old Ida Irwin, and they were married on September 1, 1915, in Redlands, California.
They lived first in Tustin and then in Santa Ana. Melville supported them as an orchardist, growing citrus. The couple never had children and were living on Mabury Street in Santa Ana when Melville died. Ida died at Santa Ana Community Hospital after a long illness on July 25, 1957, at the age of 83. She and Melville are buried at Fairhaven Memorial Park.
Melville & Ida (Irwin) Bowman
The last child of William and Ella, William Henry Bowman, (3/8/1888-12/15/1964) was born in Tustin. He attended Tustin Elementary school and studied at the Orange County Business College in Santa Ana. He worked for a short time as a reporter for both the Los Angeles Times and the Santa Ana Blade, meeting the trains at the Santa Ana depot and reporting on the prominent people arriving and departing town.
On July 4, 1908, Will Bowman married Ruth Martin at her parent’s home on east Main Street in Tustin. The Martins operated a general store out of the Columbus Tustin building on Main Street. The service was conducted by the pastor of the Advent Christian Church and the couple left for a honeymoon trip after breakfast was served to the wedding guests. Will and Ruth would eventually have four children, all boys: Ralph Curtiss (1909-1959), Claude Martin (1911-2008), William Donald (1912-2010), and Howard Lester (1919-1979). It is interesting to note that all the boys were better known by their middle names.
For the first five years the family lived on Newport Road, just south of Vanderlip, and three of their four sons were born there. In 1913 they moved to his parent’s citrus ranch on the northwest corner of Redhill Avenue and Irvine Boulevard. In 1919 Will built a house on five acres on Mitchell Avenue between Redhill and Browning and the family moved in the following year. Will and Ruth would spend the rest of their lives in this house at 1681 Mitchell Avenue, although they also had a house in Newport Beach.
In addition to owning several productive orchards, Will Bowman was also a successful building contractor, first in partnership with George Preble, and then for over 40 years with George’s son, Sam. They are credited with building the Presbyterian Church and the first high school in Tustin, the Ebel Clubhouse and the Santora Building in Santa Ana, the El Modena School, the Seventeenth Street bridge over the Santa Ana River, and the Balboa Pavilion. Bowman is also responsible for the number of houses that still stand in Old Town Tustin. He also built the large Spanish style home for Tustin businessman C.E. Utt in Lemon Heights. While Will was busy supervising the construction projects, Ruth worked for many years as the bookkeeper for the firm.
An advertisement in the 1927 Tustin High School yearbook
Will and Ruth were members of the Tustin Presbyterian church and Will was also a member of Tustin Farm Bureau, the California Growers Association and had served as president of the Santa Ana-Tustin Mutual Citrus Association.
Will retired from the construction business around 1961 but was still operating two citrus orchards at the time of his death at the age of 76. After a funeral service conducted by the pastor of the Tustin Presbyterian Church he was buried at Fairhaven Memorial Park. Ruth Bowman survived her husband by seventeen years, passing away at a local convalescent home on July 6, 1981 at the age of 93. She was buried beside her husband at Fairhaven.
William H. & Ruth (Martin) Bowman
with their first three sons, Curtiss,
Martin and Donald
Will and Ruth’s first son, Ralph Curtiss Bowman (3/24/1909-12/2/1959) was born in Tustin. He attended Tustin schools, graduated from Tustin High School in 1927 and later from Santa Ana College and the University of Southern California. He never married and worked as an architect. He served three years in the Navy during World War Two. He died at Santa Ana Community Hospital after a short illness at the age of 50. He was buried at Fairhaven Memorial Park.
Their second son, Claude Martin Bowman (4/22/1911-2/8/2008) was named after Ruth’s younger brother. He graduated from Tustin High School in 1930 and from Santa Ana College in 1932. In the spring of 1939, he eloped with Dorothy Marie Ross, a 19-year-old who was working at the same advertising firm. They were married on March 25, 1939, at the courthouse in Phoenix, Arizona. The marriage was short-lived, as they were divorced by the following year. Martin enlisted in the armed forces on April 9, 1942. While in the service he married Jean M. Miller on August 31,1943, in Chicago, Illinois. They had a son, William W. Bowman, around 1947. In 1950 they were living in Orange and Martin owned and operated a gas station. At some point they moved north to Sonoma County, where Jean died on July 10, 1997. Martin Bowman died in Sonoma County at the age of 96.
Martin’s younger brother, William Donald Bowman, (8/20/1912-1/26/2010) was born in Tustin. He graduated from Tustin High School in 1930 and like his older brothers also attended Santa Ana College. During World War Two he served as a sergeant in the 547th Bomb Squadron of the 384th Bomber Group. Before and after the war he worked for his father in his construction business. Donald was still unmarried in 1950 at the age of 37. He passed away in Healdsburg, Sonoma County, at the age of 97.
The last child of Will and Ruth Bowman, Harold Lester Bowman, (6/15/1919-2/12/1979)
was born in Tustin. He graduated from Tustin High School in 1936 and Santa Ana College in 1939. Lester married Marjory Askwith and they had a daughter and were living in Oakland, California in 1950 where Lester worked as an air traffic controller. He and Marjory divorced in 1970, and Lester Bowman died in Orange County at the age of 59.
Bowman Family Christmas gathering, December 25, 1909
Front row: children: Raymond Schlage, Margaret Schlange, Lilian Martin, Clarence Bowman.
Second row: Melville Bowman, William D. Bowman, Charles E. Bowman, Edgar L. Bowman, Anna Louise Bowman (Edgar’s wife), Olive Bowman, Ruth (Martin) Bowman (William H. Bowman’s wife), Anna Bowman (Charles’ wife), Ella Bowman wife), Homer Bowman, Joseph F. Martin
Back row: Mrs. Aurelia W. Schlange with baby Bertie, Martha Martin (wife of Joseph F. Martin), William H. Bowman, Myrtle Bowman (Homer’s daughter), Mabelle Bowman (wife of Homer).
This Christmas gathering took place at the W.D. Bowman home on the west side of Redhill, just north of Irvine Boulevard.
Mrs. Aurelia Schlange was the older sister of Anna Bowman, the wife of Charles E. Bowman. Aurelia’s husband was John Frederick Schlange, a professional photographer. It is possible that he took this photograph since he is the only family member unaccounted for in the picture.
The day after this picture was taken Joseph F. Martin was killed when the bicycle, he was riding collided with a car in Santa Ana.
See Museum file for the sources of this Family Profile
Researched by Timothy Zierer
Created: 11/25/2022
