Herman Meyer
Grace Gertrude Gray
1872 -1959
1877 - 1951

Herman Meyer, the seventh child of Frederick & Caroline Meyer, was born Oct, 29, 1872, on the family ranch at Bella Vista where he grew up attending Eureka Elementary School.

Grace Gertrude Gray was born Feb. 14, 1877, at Cow Creek, the twelfth child of Joseph & Jeanette Scott Gray. Herman & Grace were married Sept. 11, 1895, by Clergyman, G. W. Burton, at his Bella Vista Home.

Herman worked in the Balkalala Mine in Coram, Terry Lumber Mill, farmed an sold produce and poultry to the mines and Redding free market in Redding. He also hauled quartz from the Quartz Hill Mines to the railway cars where the tracks were located on the west side of the Sacramento River. Later he ran the Douglas Dairy in Churn Creek.

Herman & Grace first lived on Swede Creek Road where they started their family of thirteen children. Their first two sons died at birth and were buried in the Lemm Family Plot at Bella Vista.

1st son b. 1896 d. 1896
2nd son b. 1897 d. 1897
Annie Erva (Eugene Doll) b. 1899
Lloyd Herman b. 1901
Gerald Leroy b. 1903
John Craig b. 1905
Valentine Frederick b. 1907
Chester Bryant b. 1909
9th son b. 1911 d. 1911
Lily Grace (Lawrence Wade) b. 1912
11th son
(carried l yr. weighed 16 lbs. 4oz.)
b. 1914 d. 1914
Dorothy Loraine (Thomas Damon) b. 1915
Robert Peery b. 1917 d. 1917

Later they lived at Churntown & Quartz Hill, then moved to the Uncle Sam Ranch or Hawley Place and rented the Sheppard Ranch. In 1916, they purchased 80 acres south of the Sheppard & Hawley Ranches and built a house with lumber from an old abandoned church between Stillwater & Churn Creeks. A Bell from the church was given to the 1st Baptist Church of Redding And is now on display in front of the church. They continued renting the Sheppard Ranch, living in their present home until 1924 when Herman rented the Douglas Dairy.

Herman & Grace divorced in 1927. Herman stayed on the dairy ranch which he later sold and moved to Oroville. He then moved back to Cottonwood and when in his 80's moved to Redding to be near his daughter, Annie Doll. He passed away June, 1959, and is buried in the Millville Masonic Cemetery in the Meyer family plot.

Mother Grace moved to Anderson for a year, then back to Redding where she did home maternity nursing. In 1931 Grace moved to Richardson Springs Resort where she met and married Andrew Henry Mullen. Grace died at the home of her son, John Meyer, in Brownsville, CA, in 1951. Andrew Mullen died in 1953 at same ranch. They are both buried in the Sierra View Cemetery, Marysville, CA.

Source: Shasta Historical Society

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