Glendale, California Biographies

        Trueman, James F. was born in Truemanville, Nova Scotia, October 26, 1849. He is a descendant of William Trueman, who emigrated to America in 1775, from Yorkshire, England, with his wife and son, and settled in Nova Scotia. In 1785, William Trueman built a brick house, which up to the time it was torn down in 1920 had housed nine different generations of the Trueman family. The Truemans had been farmers in Yorkshire, and all these years in Nova Scotia they have been farmers and millers, with both grist and lumber mills. Members of the family have also been prominent in the professions. The Truemans had been Methodists at home and introduced Methodism to Nova Scotia. To them and other Yorkshire families of the settlement was due the loyalty to England at the time of the American War of Independence. That part of Nova Scotia settled by the Truemans is known as Truemanville.

        The subject of our sketch, James F. Trueman, had a common school education supplemented by attending an academy. He lived at home until he was married November 10, 1872, to Mary Alice Tupper, a daughter of David and Charlotta (Green) Tupper. Her mother was a daughter of Sir Elveen, of Shygo. Her cousin, Sir Charles Tupper, was Premier of Canada. Mrs. Trueman died at Truemanville, Nova Scotia, August 9, 1888, leaving a family of four sons and one daughter. They were: John, who died at the age of thirty-four; Winnie Louise, who died at the age of thirty-two; Henry N., who is a steamboat captain residing at Vancouver, British Columbia; Austin Earl, who died at the age of twenty-nine from the effects of an attack by highwaymen near Santa Monica two years previous, and Benjamin, a prosperous miner of Kern County, California.

        Mr. Trueman left Nova Scotia, in 1889, and went to San Francisco, where he remained for a few months before coming to Southern California. He bought the ranch at La Canada where Ex-Governor Wallace now resides and remained there for one year in partnership with Dr. Moore. Moving to Burbank, he rented a ranch for two years before buying thirty acres where he has since resided. The tract was a wilderness of sagebrush, but he set out fruit trees and grape vines and was soon reaping the results of his labors. The ranch is located on Glendale Road at Vine Street and is now being subdivided. He was at first identified with the Democratic Party, but soon, thinking that a protective tariff was necessary to the fruit growers, became a Republican. Active in politics, a worker in the ranks, but he was never an office seeker. He is a member of the Methodist Church at Burbank.

        In September 1919, Mr. Trueman returned to Truemanville for a grand family reunion. There were assembled over three hundred guests, representing the various branches of the family. Mr. James F. Trueman, as chairman, delivered the address of welcome. He told how the Truemans had grown to a family of fifteen hundred members, and how they had prospered. He quoted the saying of Judge Morse, “The Yorkshire men did three great things: they made the country, preserve the flag and founded Methodism in Nova Scotia.” Truly no man can reckon the value to the New World, of an emigrant of the caliber of William Trueman, founder of this family.