The History of the Yakima Valley, Washington, Comprising Yakima, Kittitas and
Benton Counties, The S.J. Clarke Publishing Co., 1919, Volume II, page 654

ROSS MORRIS.

Ross Morris, connected with the plant department of the Valley Telephone
Company, and also a rancher living near Zillah, was born in Harrison county,
Missouri, September 18, 1886, but has spent the greater part of his life in the
northwest. He is a son of Condee and Lovina (Alexander) Morris. The father was
born in Newburn, Indiana, in 1838, while the mother was born in Ray county,
Missouri, a representative of a pioneer family of that state. The paternal
grandfather, John Morris, was a native of Philadelphia, born in 1760, and his
death occurred in 1850. He became a pioneer of Indiana, where he took up
government land, and in that state spent his remaining days. He was married
twice and had twenty-two children. His second wife also had a large family. His
son, Condee Morris, was reared in Indiana and after the outbreak of the Civil
war enlisted as a member of Company C. Sixth Indiana Volunteer Infantry, with
which he served for three years and four months. All but seventeen members of
his company were killed, including all of the officers.

Following the war he became a contractor on the Union Pacific railroad through
Kansas and subsequently went to Missouri, where he engaged in the sawmill
business. He afterward became a resident of Harrison county, Missouri, where he
carried on farming until 1890. In that year he made his way across the country
to Goldendale, Washington, and in 1891 came to Yakima county, where he purchased
forty acres of land a half mile north of Zillah. He had contract No. 1 and deed
No. 4 from the Washington Irrigation Company, being one of the first men to buy
land under this project. In 1898 he sold twenty acres of the property, which he
had cleared and planted to hay. He planted the remaining twenty acres to apples
and was one of the leaders in the development work of the region. He lived in
Yakima most of the time and as his financial resources increased made investment
in property over the valley. He died in the year 1912 and is still survived by
his widow, who yet makes her home in Yakima.

Ross Morris obtained a public school education in Yakima and afterward pursued a
course in the State College at Pullman, Washington. Early in his business career
he spent two years with the Oregon Western Railway Company and since that time
he has been wire chief of the Valley Telephone Company. He also conducts the
home ranch near Zillah, upon which he resides, and he is likewise the owner of
forty acres on the Yakima Indian reservation, on which he raises hay. His has
been an active and useful life, productive of good results. The home ranch has
fifteen acres in apples and three acres in prunes, and Mr. Morris is thoroughly
familiar with the best methods of developing and caring for his orchards and
packing and shipping his fruit.

On the 28th of April, 1917, Mr. Morris was married to Miss Anna Steffen, a
native of North Dakota and a daughter of A. E. Steffen, who removed to King
county, Washington, where he took up the occupation of farming. Mr. and Mrs.
Morris have become parents of one child, Jean.

Fraternally Mr. Morris is connected with the Masons and is a past master of
Meridian Lodge No. 196, of Zillah. He is also a Royal Arch Mason, belonging to
the chapter at Yakima, and is identified with the Knights Templar Commandery at
Yakima and with the consistory and the Mystic Shrine at Tacoma. His political
allegiance is given to no party. He maintains an independent course, voting for
the candidates whom he regards as best qualified for office. He is leading a
busy and useful life and the results which he has accomplished place him with
the substantial business men of his section of the valley.

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Submitted to the Washington Bios Project in December 2007 by Jeffrey L. Elmer.
Submitter has no additional information about the subject of this article.