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cratic convention held in Butte county, at Spanish ranch, on the first day of July. He has resided at the county-seat continually, moving with it when it changed.

He ran for county judge, in 1867, and was elected, but, as the supervisors counted out the Cherokee vote, he was unable to take his seat. In 1869, Mr. Lott was nominated by the democrats for district judge, and though the district was republican, he was elected over Judge Sexton and served one term. Since that time he has been an active practitioner of law, and is also extensively engaged in mining and farming, in all of which he has had remarkable success. He is a man of high culture and broad intellectuality, having a vast fund of information. Many of the most important cases tried in the county have been participated in by him. He was married in May, 1856, to Miss Susan F. Hyer, and has had three children, two of whom are still living. He belongs to Table Mountain lodge at Cherokee, to the Oroville commandery, No. 5, and is at present grand deputy of the state commandery.

JUDGE MOSES BEAN, the first county judge of Butte county, was a native of the state of Maryland, having been born in the month of November, 1800. He lived for a number of years in that state, but before coming of age resided, for short periods, in North Carolina and Tennessee, and, at the age of twenty, went with his father to Missouri, settling at Farmington, at the foot of Iron mountain. The western states were then in their earliest infancy, and the settlers of 1820 had to contend with all the trials and tribulations of a pioneer existence. In 1823, he was united in marriage to Miss Elizabeth Cunningham, also of Maryland, whose family had emigrated to the west at the same time the Beans had settled there. While at this place, Mr. Bean was actively engaged in lumbering and farming. In 1823, he also began the study of law, and, after a few years, was admitted to practice in the supreme court of Missouri. He afterward moved to south-western Missouri, settling at what is now the flourishing village of Lebanon-there being no sign of a town at that time. He resided there until 1849, when, on the twenty-sixth of April, he started overland with his second son, John, for California, arriving at Long's bar, in Butte county, on the first day of November. They mined at Long's bar for some time. At the first county election held in Butte, on the tenth of June, 1850, Moses Bean was elected to the office of county judge, receiving the largest vote of any officer. In 1852, he resigned the office, the governor appointing George W. Schults to fill the unexpired term. He remained in the county, engaged in mining pursuits, until 1857, when he left, June 20, from San Francisco, on his return to Missouri. He died at Lebanon, September 20, 1866. Five children were born to Judge Bean, three of whom are now living. John Bean still resides in Oroville.

Judge Bean was a large, fine-looking man, standing over six feet in height, and having a countenance full of pleasantry and kindness. His judgment was generally correct on legal matters, and he had a peculiar confidence in the soundness of his opinions. An incident of this kind is related in the history of the county court. He was one of those great-hearted men, honored and respected by all. On one occasion he criticised, in rather severe terms, Judge Lott, who was trying a case in his court. The latter became angry, and with language more forcible than respectful, came back at his honor in good style. An officer of the court suggested that Lott be fined, but with a merry twinkle in his eye, he replied, "No, no! I can't think of fining him, for he only gave me as good as he got."

JUDGE JOSEPH E. N. LEWIS.-Judge Lewis was born in Jefferson county, Virginia, in 1826, and received his education at William and Mary's College. He studied law with B. F. Washington, afterwards of the San Francisco Examiner, and was admitted to the bar of Virginia, but did not practice in that state. He came to California in 1849, in company with Mr. Washington, and settled in Butte county, where he continued to reside until his death. He was present and took part in the organization of Butte county. In 1851, Mr. Lewis was elected to fill the unexpired term of Adams as state senator for Butte and Shasta counties. In 1853, he was elected county judge, serving with great credit to him

self and his party-the democratic. On the twenty-fourth of June, 1869, he was nominated by the democrats of the district for district judge, and that same evening died of heart disease. He was sitting on the front porch of Peter Freer's residence, talking with Mrs. Freer, when she, noticing that he was silent for a few moments, touched him and found that he was dead.

Judge Sexton, in his article on the "Past and Present of Butte County," speaks of him as follows: "Mr. Lewis was a large man, mentally and physically, and of high intellectual culture, of strong, positive powers of mind. He did not love study for its own sake, but when it was necessary to take hold of any question, and especially in his profession, he did not and would not give it up, though it required weeks and months of hard work, until he felt he had mastered it. He was a slow thinker, but a logical and correct one. At his death, he was justly considered one of the ablest jurists in the northern part of the state."

Of the attorneys who have been admitted to practice law in the courts of this county, many re sided elsewhere and came here but occasionally, while others, though residents of the county, never engaged regularly in the practice of their profession. The following list contains the names of those regular practitioners who have either removed to other scenes or crossed forever the waters of the silent river: Moses Bean, Reuel C. Baker, Seneca Ewer, Joseph E. N. Lewis, Alonzo W. Adams, Joseph W. McCorkle, George Adams Smith, Warner Earle, A. Maurice, Jr., J. B. Barker, Patrick H. Harris, Warren T. Sexton, J. J. Kleine, Frederick M. Smith, Silas W. W. Coughey, M. H. Farley, Charles G. Hubbard, J. G. Lawton, Jr., A. C. Morse, D. W. Cheeseman, H. A. Gaston, J. G. Howard, G. W. Kretzinger, W. H. Rhodes, Simon Rosenbaum, John S. Berry, John Lambert, P. A. McRae, L. D. Marston, George G. Berry, Thomas Bay, St. John Jackson, S. L. Howard, James C. Martin, A. A. Cooper, John Dick, A. M. Bailey.

The following list embraces the attorneys now practicing at the bar in this county, the first four gentlemen having begun their practice at this bar during the early years of the county's existence :

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THE PRESS OF BUTTE COUNTY.

BY HON. GEORGE H. CROSSETTE.

It was a sultry day in October, 1853, that the writer was wearing out the time in front of the hotel he was endeavoring to keep in the valley, some eight miles from Oroville, and about thirteen from the county-seat, Bidwell's bar, when a printing-press and material for a newspaper passed on its way to the capital of the county. Reared in a printing-office, the sight of the familiar press made everything pale into insignificance, and rendered the hotel business, always tiresome and disagreeable, doubly so. The valley in which the hotel was located seemed dry and yellow in the October sun, and the glorious hills bounding it on the east seemed only a prison-house. The material was labelled to "C. W. Stiles & Co.," and composed the material for the Butte Record, the first number of which was issued November 12, 1853.

The material was purchased by C. W. Stiles with money contributed by the prominent citizens and officers of the county. Some of the material still remains in the Record office, after a lapse of nearly twenty-nine years. Associated with Stiles in the mechanical and editorial department of the paper were L. P. Hall, still a resident of the State, Harry DeCourcey, a writer of considerable ability, who was found dead in his bed in San Francisco shortly after leaving the county, and James Kerr. The typographical force was composed of Messrs. Hall and Kerr. Mr. Stiles was not a printer, and the business being new to him, the paper was scarcely a financial success from the start. A difficulty between DeCourcey and Hall, in which the latter received a cut under the shoulder-blade which disabled him for some time and sent DeCourcey to do penance in the county jail, left the office in a helpless condition, and Mr. Stiles sought out the present proprietor, and assuming the ownership of the paper and its material, sold it to him, taking his hotel and ranch in exchange therefor. It was in February, 1854, that the paper passed into the possession of George H. Crossette, who has continued its publication since, with the exception of a period of about two years, from 1864 to the spring of 1866. During this latter period it was run by James Wagstaff, as the Oroville Union Record. After its re-purchase by Mr. Crossette, the name of Butte Record was restored to it. Mr. Wagstaff died with consumption shortly after disposing of the office.

The Record office was removed to Oroville, following the county-seat, in July, 1856, and its publication continued there until 1873, when it was removed to Chico. From July, 1856, to September, 1858, it was issued as a morning daily. Frazer river and other distant mining excitements carried off the population of Oroville to such an extent that it was not deemed advisable to continue it as a daily, and its weekly publication was resumed in September, 1858.

John De Mott, a Marysville pioneer of 1850, was associated with Mr. Crossette in the publication of the Record, from its removal from Bidwell's bar to Oroville, in 1856, to his death, which occurred in January, 1860.

1873, it was removed to Chico, and issued daily and weekly during the election campaign of 1873. In January, 1877, the Chico Daily Evening Record was issued, and since that period it has continued to issue a daily and weekly edition.

In the spring of 1856, C. G. Lincoln started the North Californian, in Oroville, a weekly publication, which continued during the exciting presidential election of that year. In 1857, during a somewhat exciting local election for district judge, the paper was issued daily, one day as the North Californian and the next as the Butte Democrat. Of course, under such circumstances, the paper did

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