San Joaquin County Biographies
Ref: Page 1586
Transcribed by: Linda Diane Jackson 11/16/2009
OTTO DIETZ
Twenty-seven years ago Otto Dietz purchased his present ranch of twenty-six acres located one mile northwest of Thornton, which he has developed into one of the finest alfalfa ranches in the vicinity. He was born at Steinheim, near Geissen, in Hessen Darmstadt, Germany, July 15, 1869, a son of Kaspar and Elizabeth (Eickle) Dietz. His father was a brick mason by trade, and lived to be eighty-five years old; the mother still lives in the old country at the age of eighty-eight. Otto is the youngest of a family of four children; William is deceased, and the other two are Bertha and Henry.
Otto Dietz was educated in the public school and the business college of his native country, and was reared to help on his father's farm. At twenty-one years of age he learned the brick mason's trade, which he followed until 1892, when he came to the United States and direct to California, settling at Tracy. He found work on a ranch for a year and a half, and then removed to the New Hope section, where he has since remained. When he purchased his ranch of twenty-six acres, in 1896, it was covered with the natural growth of brush and tules, which Mr. Dietz cleared away, and leveled and planted the land to alfalfa; and today his ranch is classed among the most productive in that section. Besides erecting a good, comfortable house and other necessary buildings, he has installed a six-inch pump equipped with a ten-horse-power motor and has piped the place with twelve-inch concrete pipes for irrigation. On this ranch he runs a dairy of twenty-five Holstein cows.
On April 26, 1891, in Germany, Mr. Dietz was married to Miss Bertha Kroell, also a native of Steinheim, Germany, a daughter of George and Margaret (Mumbir) Kroell. Her parents were farmers, and reared a family of eight children: George, Ferdinand, Elizabeth, Anna, Gustave, Grace, Eliza and Bertha, now Mrs. Dietz. Mr. and Mrs. Dietz are the parents of two children: Laura, Mrs. Doty of Elk Grove; and Alma, employed in Stockton. There are two grandchildren, Margaret and Wilbur Doty. Mr. Dietz is a stanch American citizen, and he and his wife are members of the Lutheran Church at Lodi.
History of
SAN JOAQUIN COUNTY
CALIFORNIA
With A
Biographical Review
of
The Leading Men and Women of the County Who Have Been
Identified with Its Growth and Development
from the Early Days to the Present
HISTORY BY
George H. Tinkham
HISTORIC RECORD COMPANY
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA
1923
San Joaquin County Biographies ~ Archive Biography Index ~ Archive Index
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