William Welles Hollister
| William Welles Hollister | |
|---|---|
William Welles Hollister (1818-1886)
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| Personal details | |
| Born |
January 12, 1818 Hanover, Ohio |
| Died | August 8, 1886 (aged 68) Santa Barbara, California |
| Spouse(s) | Annie Hannah James |
| Children | Jennie B. Hollister William Welles Hollister, Jr. Harrald A. Hollister John J. Hollister, Sr. Lionel E. Hollister Stanley Hollister |
| Parents | John Hollister Philena Hubbard |
| Alma mater | Kenyon College |
| Occupation | Rancher, Entrepreneur and Founder of Hollister, California |
William Welles Hollister (1818–1886) was a native of Ohio who came west in the 1850s and became a wealthy rancher and entrepreneur in California.
William Welles Hollister, was born on Jan. 12, 1818 near Hanover, Ohio, the son of Philena Hubbard and John Hollister, and a grandson of John Hollister and Mary Welles a direct descendant of Governor Thomas Welles, the Fourth Colonial Governor of Connecticut, and a descendant of Edmund Rice, an early immigrant to Massachusetts Bay Colony. When he was 15, he attended Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio, although his health prevented him from going full-time. After his father died, William Welles Hollister, with his eyesight failing, left college without graduating, and went to farming and merchandising.
In 1852, Hollister sold his farm and stock of goods and purchased two or three hundred head of cattle and started across the plains for California, where he sold his cattle and returned immediately to Ohio and prepared for another trip to California.
In 1854 he, along with his brother Joseph Hubbard Hollister, his sister, Lucy A. Brown, with an additional fifty men and four women (including Mrs. Brown), led the first large transcontinental sheep drive, bringing 10,000 merino sheep from Hanover, Licking County, Ohio. The plan was to supply miners during the California Gold Rush with meat. The party took a southern route from Salt Lake City in order to avoid the winter snows of the Sierra Nevada. Traveling through New Mexico and Arizona, they pastured their flocks for a year near what is now Santa Barbara. Although only about a thousand sheep survived, Hollister was able to make a considerable fortune when wool prices spiked during the Civil War, as well as catering to those who searched for gold.
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