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Bio-Sawyers
SURNAMES:  AYRES, BROWN,

A native of New York. who spent many years in the well drilling industry and who is now the owner of a fine twenty-acre ranch, is George W. Slocum, of Church Avenue, San Martin. He was born in Cattaraugus County. N. Y.. March 4, 1855, and there he lived during the years of his young manhood. Attending the Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia in 1876, Mr. Slocum was much impressed with the wonders of the wide world exhibited there and so was given the incentive to start out and see for himself. In 1878 he went to the cil fields of Pennsylvania, then coming into wide prominence as a new industry for this country, and here began at the bottom in Warren and McKean counties. Later he took up contract drilling, and in this he was very successful.

In 1886 Mr. Slocum came to Stockton, Cal., and was employed by Col. E. J. Beane, and there he followed well drilling, putting down several test wells. but was not rewarded with oil in sufficient quantities to make it a paying 'venture. He next turned his attention to drilling water wells, spending one summer in that occupation in Santa Clara County. Mr. Slocum next went to San Diego, in 1889, and followed his trade as oil well driller and working in the mines.  at Julian until 1895; then was at Half Moon Bay, next at Newhall in 1898, then going to San Benito County in the fall of 1900, where he was employed by the Watsonville Oil Company, and has been in their employ off and on until 1921, when he retired to his ranch. His home was in Gilroy until 1917. The possibilities of the San Martin section appealed to Mr. Slocum strongly and he determined to make this his home, and accordingly purchased his ranch property in 1917, at San Martin, which he has developed into a fine home place, having set out six acres in prunes.
Mr. Slocum's marriage united him with Miss Mary Ayres, the daughter of the late John Ayres, and they are the parents of two children, Ethel, at home, and Helen, Mrs. J. S. Brown of San Jose. In fraternal circles Mr. Slocum is a Master Mason, belonging to Keith Lodge, Gilroy, and politically the Republican party has had his allegiance for many years.

From Eugene T. Sawyers' History of Santa Clara County,California,  published by Historic Record Co. , 1922. page 1480

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