Ceres all started with wheat growing

By JEFF BENZIGER Editor of the C eres (C alif .) C ourier

Good soil, good neighbors and a quiet place to live have been attractive qualities that have made Ceres what it is today. Those same qualities were part of Daniel Whitmore’s Ceres when the town was laid out in 1874 for the first time.

Like many following the California Gold Rush of 1849, the Whitmore decided to head east after hearing about California’s opportunities and mile climate. Their journey, which would eventually bring them to Ceres, started in the spring of 1854 when the Whitmores left Pittsford, Mich. in a wagon train. In those days, wagon trains started in spring, hoping to reach the rugged Sierra Nevada range before the first snowfall of fall and winter.

About five months later, on Sept. 1, 1854, the Whitmore party arrived in Stockton and settled on what is now the Cherokee Lane area near Stockton. They remained there until 1857.

Whitmore brought his family south to what would later become Stanislaus County in 1866. Accounts say he settled on land just north of the Tuolumne River which he farmed. In those days the absence of irrigation in a very dry climate meant growing wheat. He later farmed on 10,000 acres south of the river on what is now presentday Ceres.

Following his brother Daniel to California was Richard Keith Whitmore. He arrived in 1856 and found the area near Collegeville east of Stockton as a fertile place to farm. Richard settled in the Ceres area in 1869 after buying land from Levi Carter.

Eldest son Richard K. Whitmore, affectionately called “the Colonel,” took over his dad’s farming operation. The 1881 historical account gives the following entry for Richard K. Whitmore: “His ranch consists of one thousand, two hundred and eighty acres, favorably located five miles from Modesto and 10 miles from the river. It is only two miles from the village of Ceres, where school, church and railroad advantages are obtained. The average soil is of a sandy character, yielding about ten bushels per acre, average years. He has also farmed on rented land of about the same nature, in tracts of 2,000 acres on D. Whitmore’s ranch for the past ten years. As raising wheat is the chief business, only a few cows are kept for milk, and thirty-five horses for farming purposes.”

The Whitmores were intolerant of alcohol