| Olive Through the Ages
Citizens
and their homes | Biographies
| Memories
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Louis Schorn was one of Olive's entrepreneurial residents
who arrived in the community during its bustling, boomtown years of
the 1880s. He was affiliated with two of its prominent establishments
of the time: Olive Milling Company and Olive Heights Hotel. Schorn remained
an active figure in Orange County until the mid-1890s, working for the
Anaheim Union Water Company and then serving on the Orange County Board
of Supervisors.
My thanks go to Chris Jepsen at the Orange County Archives for providing
the photo of Louis Schorn from the Archives' collection, and to Joel
at Anaheim Cemetery for going out of his way to help me locate the Schorn
family plot.
NOTE: Click/tap the thumbnail images below to view larger images in separate
browser windows or tabs.
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| Louis Schorn circa 1870s |
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| Olive Heights Hotel circa
1888 |
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| Olive Milling Co. circa
1910 |
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| Louis Schorn's home in
2014 |
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| Olive trees Louis Schorn
planted after 1892 |
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| Schorn family burial plot
in Anaheim Cemetery |
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| Louis Schorn's marker |
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Louis Schorn was born to Louis Schorn and
Cordelia Gunsenheimer in Obermerzpach Unterfranken, Bavaria, Germany
on March 1, 1839. He emigrated to the United States of America in 1856
and worked as a dry goods clerk in Alabama, becoming a naturalized citizen
in 1860. A year later, at the beginning of the American Civil War, Louis
returned to Germany to visit his parents and remained overseas for the
next three years.
A year before the Civil War came to an end, Louis returned to the U.S.A.
and from 1864 to 1867 was employed as a clerk in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
He then worked for a year in Kansas before moving to Fort Worth, Texas
where he co-owned and operated Novelty Flouring Mills and a grocery
business over the course of the next 14 years.
On June 26, 1880 Louis married Minna ("Minnie") H.L. Stely,
the 19-year-old daughter of U.S. Hotel's recently widowed proprietress.
Sadly, their first born child Louis Schorn, Jr. did not live past infancy.
In 1882, the Schorns moved to west Anaheim, California with Minna's
younger sister Emma and mother Rosina Stely. Here the couple's daughter
Rosa Louise was born to them in March. Late in September that year,
Louis purchased 40 acres of property in Anaheim with orchards, vineyards,
and a single-story home. By the next month, he purchased more than 100
additional acres, and settled his family there for a few years. In the
ensuing years, he would devote much time to the cultivation of fruits
and vines, and manufacturing wines and brandies.
Louis began investing in the Olive Milling Co. in 1883. The flour mill
was operated by Thomas Dillin and two of his sons, the eldest (Curtis)
who married Minna's sister. At that time, Louis still owned more than
1000 acres of land in El Paso, Texas. While visiting El Paso to sell
his property, daughter Minnie Louise was born to the couple in January
1884.
In March 1885, Minna died after giving birth to their fourth child Emma
Minnie (Emma Louise) who died a month later in April. Both were laid
to rest in Anaheim Cemetery. Louis, now with two young daughters to
raise—Rosa now three and Minnie at 14 months—would never
remarry.
Despite his personal losses, Louis' enterprising, persevering, and industrious
spirit never deserted him. In 1887, he and co-founders Thomas Dillin,
C. Culvert, and Washington Martin organized the Olive Milling, Land
& Improvement Company, and established the Olive Heights tract.
Schorn built the Olive Heights Hotel at Orange Avenue and Hope Street
(present day Lincoln Avenue) to house the workers of the flour mill.
In 1888 he purchased some lots in the tract and built a Victorian home
at the corner of Bixby and Ocean View. Following the death of Thomas
Dillin in September 1889, Louis became president of the Olive Milling
Co. The mill burned down later that same month, but was rebuilt the
following year and re-opened in April at the corner of Hope and Ocean
View.
Louis served as president of the Anaheim Union Water Company in 1890,
and then on the Orange County Board of Supervisors from February 9,
1891 to January 1, 1895. A 1900 census showed Louis Schorn residing
in "Orange Township, Orange, Calif.," widowed with two children:
Rosa Schorn and Minnie Schorn.
In 1906, Louis sold his stake in the Olive Milling Co. and subsequently
moved out of state. He was listed in the 1910 Beatty, Nevada census
as a 71-year-old, widowed resident with a 24-year-old unmarried daughter,
Minnie Schorn. A 1920 census listed Louis as an 80-year-old home gardener
living in Pasadena, Los Angeles with 35-year-old daughter Minnie Perrelet,
a post office clerk.
Louis Schorn died of old age and pneumonia in Alhambra, California on
April 12, 1922, at the age of 83. He was buried in Anaheim Cemetery
on April 14 beside his beloved wife Minna.
- Daralee, September 24, 2009
Sources: Wayne Dell Gibson, The Olive Mill:
Orange County's Pioneer Industry. Santa Ana, CA: Orange County Historical
Society, 1975; ProQuest database of historical Los Angeles Times articles
dated 1882; Ancestry.com, FamilySearch.org, FindAGrave.com, Genealogy.com,
RootsWeb.com; Anaheim Cemetery entries by Ann Nepsa and Melanie Goss,
November 11, 2002, http://www.rootsweb.com/~usgenweb/ca/orange/ anaheim-notes.html,
http://files.usgwarchives.net/ca/orange/cemeteries/anaheim.txt; Google
Books: History of Orange County, California With Biographical Sketches,
Samuel Armor, 1921, Orange County, CA; Orange County Biographies: An
Illustrated History of Southern California, Chicago: The Lewis Publishing
Company, 1890, transcribed by Kathy Sedler, http://www.calarchives4u.com/biographies/orange/oran-scho.htm;
The Southwestern Reporter, West Publishing Company, 1912; Tarrant County
TXGenWeb 1878-79 City Directory, http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~txtarran/citydirectory/1878-79-cd-5.htm
and 1878-79-cd-6.htm.
Olive residents
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