John and Emma Lemon lived with their six children on a ranch in Cheney,
Washington. In the summer of 1897, John and John Jr. took a trip to
California to explore the possibilities of that state. They found
the area around Watsonville to be especially attractive. They returned
to Washington, sold their ranch, and prepared to move. Arriving in
July of 1898, on the 18th and 19th, they camped south of the river
at Watsonville. John, Win(fred) and John Jr. rode out to Corralitos
to look at a place in Brown's Valley they had seen advertised. It
was just south of the Aldridge homestead that today is near Allan
Lane. It proved to have the sandiest soil of any piece of land in
the whole district, so it was no attraction to John. On July 21, they
drove their wagon through Watsonville and then turned northward. They
took the left-hand road (present-day Buena Vista Road) in Freedom
where the monument is today. They stopped to rest by the roadside
near a house belonging to the old Baucom couple. Emma went into the
Baucom house to make inquiries and met a Mrs. Mackrell who was visiting
there. She told them she had a place to sell in Corralitos and that
they could go up there and camp as long as they wanted. The property
was about a mile up Eureka Canyon from the Corralitos Store. They
bought the place on August 10, 1898, paying $1700 for 28 ½ acres.
The property is still owned by the Lemon family today.
At that time, there were two old houses on the property. These were
torn down and a new two-story house was constructed. Many of the apple
trees growing on the farm were not in good condition. They took out
the unproductive ones and pruned up the rest. They planted more fruit
trees. They planted loganberries along the creek for a temporary source
of income. Emma sold eggs to a San Francisco market, too. During the
summer the kids helped with the crops. The girls dressed in overalls
that they made themselves. Sometimes they cut apricots for a neighbor.
On the hot summer days the kids went swimming in the Corralitos Creek
that ran through their farm. The girls did not have swimsuits, so
they wore old dresses. They did not go swimming with the boys who
wore no clothes at all.
Dora Sibyl Lemon played the reed organ at the Corralitos School.
Mr. Price, who was the principal at the time, often had her play for
him the tunes he wished to try out before using them in the school
assembly. In 1908, at the end of her third year of Watsonville High
School, the school put on a charge for tuition for all out of town
students. Dora's sister, Gladys, was planning to enter high school
the next year. The cost for two high school children was more than
their mother was willing to pay, so she arranged for Dora and Gladys
to attend the high school in Santa Cruz, sixteen miles from their
home. This high school did not charge tuition for out of town students
and was actually a better school than the one in Watsonville. Their
mother found the girls a small place to live in while they were attending
school. When the weather was good, the girls rode their bicycles home
on weekends. On their return to Santa Cruz, they took with them as
much food as their bicycles could carry.
View of Lemon house and property on Eureka Canyon Road circa 1920
The two-story Lemon house and Eureka Canyon Road
John and Emma's son Earl Hershel Lemon was born in Corralitos on
January 24, 1900. About 1920, Earl and his older brother Win(fred)
got a car for their father. They planned to teach him how to drive
it. One day he went out on his own to try it. He backed it onto a
stump. He was embarrassed, he got the horse team to pull it off so
his sons would not know. The car went back into the barn and he never
drove it again.
One day Earl was driving the car back from their orchard property
near Highland Way in Eureka Canyon. He and a worker had been pruning.
Earl's dog was in the front seat with him and the worker was in the
back seat. Near the Eureka Canyon School there were twin bridges,
Earl was driving down a grade as a horse and buggy were coming up.
He could not stop, so to avoid hitting the buggy he went off the road
and went about thirty feet down into the creek. The dog ended up in
the back seat. Earl and the worker were all right. The car never recovered.
They took all the salvageable parts off of it, and left the rest in
the creek. The dog would never cross the bridge in a car again. He
jumped out when they neared it, walked across, and then got back inside.
Earl H. Lemon sitting in wrecked car circa 1920.
Photos and information provided by Earl (Bud) Lemon.
