P. A. Chalfant

In the hour when each sentence means heartache, best comprehended within homes over which the black wing of death has 
cast its shade, duty compels that from which sorrow would shrink.

Pleasant Arthur Chalfant, founder and senior proprietor of this paper, passed peacefully into eternal rest at 12:20 
o'clock Saturday morning after an illness of over two weeks.

The funeral services occurred Sunday.  Rev. J.M. Wilson delivering a sermon at the Academy, after which the interment 
at the Masonic cemetery was conducted by the Masons, of which order he has long been an honored member.

Besides his own family, his brother W. N. Chalfant, of Iowa City, sister, Mrs. E. C. Bivins, of Philadelphia, and 
half-brother J. E. Parker of Independence, survive him.

Deceased was born in Highland County, Ohio, not far from Chilicothe, January 14th, 1831.  His father William Chalfant, 
was a miller; his mother came from the Arthurs' a family in whose records are found the names of distinction.  In a 
few years the family removed to Iowa, and there the father died.  Some years later the widowed mother was married to 
Thomas Parker, whose closing years were spent in this county.

In his nineteenth year, P. A. Chalfant joined a party bound for California.  That party traveled part of the distance 
in company with the unfortunates who soon after perished in and gave its name to Death Valley.  Separating from them, 
he and his companions chose a course further north and late in 1849 crossed the Sierras into northern California.  He 
passed the '50's in mining in Trinity County keeping store and doing other work.  The Florence, Idaho mining 
excitement lured him northward.  In the next decade he ran a sawmill near the present site of the rich De Lamar mines 
- a region then overrun by hostile redskins.  In March 1867, near Boise City, he married Miss Adaline Slater, who with 
their surviving children, Misses Mabel, Emma, Agnes, and Blanche Chalfant, and W. A. Chalfant, editor of this paper, 
was at his bedside as his mortal day drew on to its close.

After a brief residence near Suisun, Cal., deceased came to Independence and with J. E. Parker established the Inyo 
Independent in 1870.  As an editor he was able, forceful and fearless, and under his chief-editorship the Independent 
attained a prominent place is coast newspaper circles.  After selling his interest in 1881, he tried mining ventures 
in this county and Arizona, but without success.  April 4, 1885, he launched this paper, and was its editor until he 
entered on the duties of the County Assessorship, in 1887.  That responsible office he held for twelve years, and 
would have again been a nominee had the wishes of the public governed the convention's course.

During his residence at Independence he was appointed Receiver of the Land Office, but resigned on learning that the 
appointment was brought about by a dishonest faction.

His ingenuity in mechanics would have won him success had he chosen that line of work.  Among the many contrivances 
devised was a machine for addressing newspapers, a labor now done by hand in all offices.  This he patented, and 
refused offers to purchase, as he expected to improve it.  Another was one for wrapping papers, a labor now done by 
hand in all offices.  This he patented and refused offers to purchase, as he expected to improve it.  A perfected 
model was made by him, but was burned in the fire which swept away the family home last spring.

Every Inyoite can furnish a eulogy of him, for few there are but knew him and were his friends.  Perhaps it might 
better be the part of another to record the tribute his character deserves; and yet, though the hand-tremble in 
unison with the throb of a sorrowing heart, let us lay upon his memory a feeble and dim tracing of the wreath that 
is his due.

He had convictions and the courage of them.  Morality and right, truth and justice, were the guiding stars of his 
course.  The hospitality and generosity of the days of old, and of the pioneers of which he was a worthy 
representative, lived over in his mind.  Often did he extend the hand of leniency or of charity to the unfortunate, 
sometimes to his detriment.  No work of good and no means of progress but had his support; and long after the sad 
day when he was laid in his windowless palace of rest will the influence of his work be felt in the county to which 
so many of his years were given.

Of never-questioned integrity and outspoken principle, his life may well serve as an example for others.  From no 
one did he ever withhold a just due; to none did he do an intended wrong.  

Greed and a wish for gain were foreign to his nature.  Money to him was but for the good of those who depended on 
him.  Home was his all; and whatever made that sacred spot more comfortable, more happy, was his aim.

He believed in an unerring Master Hand, under whose direction all earthly problems will sooner or later be made 
clear.  His was not a nature given to gloom.  Whether fortune smiled faintly or adversity's dark days came, he met 
it all with unshaken courage.  Success as measured by sordid standards, was never his; still he did that which is 
above wealth - a contented but ambitious mind, the love of those near him, and the sincere esteem and respect of 
every acquaintance.

Idleness had no place in his rules of life.  He was untiring and unselfish in service for those he loved, and those 
whose needs appealed to his generous, kindly heart.  His force and will power heeded not the limitation of his 
failing physical frame.  He retained his mental vitality unimpaired to the last, and his day closed not in eclipse, 
but as the sun sinks behind the distant bills in an unclouded sky.  God bade him put by the things of earth; and as 
one with worn-out frame sinks to rest after a day of faithful labor in willing work, so he slept.

Though affection would now linger, feeling that the tale of his worth is not half told, and though recurring 
memories of the over kind and affectionate husband and father bring a flood of thoughts of considerate deeds, yet 
this must end.  And so, in sad farewell, we hope and believe that on a better shore, where sorrows come not and 
where God reads the truth of all lives, our departed has been received as one of the kindly and upright of earth.

The Inyo Register, Bishop, Inyo County, California
Thursday, February 7, 1901
Transcribed by Pat Houser for Inyo County GenWeb, March 7, 2005