Crouch, Ernest Roy

Notes:

Personal Records, Maureen (Molly) McGUIRE COLSON:

During World War I Grandpa had the only assay office between Portland, OR, and San Francisco, CA. At first he operated it in Grants Pass, then built an assay office very near the log home he built on Laureldale Lane. It can be seen in the older photographs of the house and in the painting by Louis J. Arnold.
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When Grandpa was a boy in White Salmon, WA, a traveler came to town with a phonograph. It was the first one anyone had ever seen and the traveler charged admission to listen to it.
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Grandpa wanted to learn how to play the fiddle, but couldn't afford to buy one, so he built his own. Later when he had more money, he bought one from the Montgomery Ward Catalog.
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Grandpa & Grandma had lots of livestock over time, cows, etc. The last pair of hogs they had were about 1945-46, named Ham and Bacon, so noone would forget what their ultimate purpose would be.
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THE CROUCH FAMILY by Pearl Crouch Rice

My father, Ernest Roy Crouch had been a chemical engineer and assayer in Southern Oregon. He studied at home and passed the State examination. Gold fever had been the lure which brought his tall, portly father, Oscar, his three brothers, Earl, Erwin, and Edwin (Ted), from the Portland [Oregon] area around 1900. They must have had a roistering good time, fishing and hunting with no licenses or limits and few bounaries or fences. They took only what was needed for food, however, using deer hides for leather, bear hides for rugs, goose down for pillows, and rendered bear grease for their hair and boots.
Mother's family settled in the Grants Pass area about the same time, coming from Tillamook, Cottage Grove and Roseburg. Her father, Hugh Bell Hendricks, had been an early day teacher near Roseburg. He had fallen in love with his star pupil, Nancy Jane Gilkison, a tiny, winsome fifteen year old, and married her.
My Hendricks grandparents raised their family of two boys, Cassius and Robert, and one girl, Daisy Bell (my mother) in the Grants Pass area where other members of their family, the GHkisons, lived. Grandpa Hendricks was also an attorney and real estate entrepreneur in the burgeoning community. A plat of Grants Pass shows an "H. B. Hendricks" Subdivision.
Mother was a beauty and the darling of her handsome uncles and brothers. She loved to dance and play the piano. Besides working in her father's law office, she received some training at the St. Mary's Academy at Medford. Here she remembers leaming that a young lady does not spread her butter with a fork.
Grandma Hendricks became a "divorced" woman, a rarity in those days especially in the strait-laced Gilkison family. Grandpa sought greener pastures and sued for divorce. He never remarried, however, ending his days living in a cabin up Louse Creek, a recluse and poet.
Grandma, independent as a "hog on ice," five feet two of determination and grit, picked hops and packed apples with her daughter, Daisy, for a living. Later, with her son, Cash, she opened THE SPA, a candy and confectionery store, first on Sixth Street where Boyko's Stationery [between E and F Streets, on the NW corner of the alley] was and later on "G" Street about where the Rogue Craftsmen is located [in the 100 block on the Southwest side of the Street]. She also operated rooming houses at 310 West "L" Street and at the old Hollowell house on the corner of Seventh & F Streets.
My impulsive mother answered an ad for a cook at the Alameda Mine near Galice which employed over one hundred men. She was hired immediately by my father, the foreman. He set about straightaway wooing her for the more permanent position as his wife. They were married for over fifty years.
Daddy also worked as a mine foreman at the Boswell Mine, the Ashland Mine, the Golden Note Mine; had an assay office on Sixth Street and traveled over Southern Oregon and Northern California during the first World War assaying chrome for the government. However, finding the assay work too confining, he first rented, and later
owned a fruit orchard (Laureldale Orchard) located about three miles from town. At the time, it was one of the largest peach orchards in Jackson and Josephine County. This is where he raised his family, but all that is another story. From Pearl of the Peach Orchard by Pearl Crouch Rice.
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From Daily Courier, Grants Pass, OR--Week of May 15, 1914
"E. R. Crouch is fitting up an asssay office in the Paddock Building and wil lbe ready for business May 15. Mr. Crouch has 10 years experience in assaying and chemical work."
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Buried:
Fir & Almond St. Granite Hill Cemetery

Ernest married Hendricks, Daisy Belle on 19 Oct 1904 in Grants Pass, Josephine Co., OR. Daisy (daughter of Hendricks, Hugh Bell and Gilkison, Nancy Jane) was born on 7 Oct 1883; died on 4 Aug 1961 in Grants Pass, Josephine Co., OR; was buried in Grants Pass, Josephine, Oregon, USA. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

1. Crouch, Alice Ramona "Ramona" was born on 5 Sep 1909 in Grants Pass, Josephine Co., OR; died on 7 Oct 1997 in Grants Pass, Josephine Co., OR; was buried in Grants Pass, Josephine, Oregon, USA.
2. Living
3. Crouch, Daisy Ernestine "Betty" was born on 9 Sep 1921 in Grants Pass, Josephine Co., OR; died on 19 Oct 1965 in Altadena, Los Angeles, California, USA.