The History of the Yakima Valley, Washington, Comprising Yakima, Kittitas and Benton Counties, The S.J. Clarke Publishing Co., 1919, Volume II, page 990 CAPTAIN J. W. VICKERS. Captain J. W. Vickers, a prominent representative of the wholesale fruit trade of Washington conducting business at Kennewick, was born in Comanche, Texas, in August, 1868, his parents being E. P. and Virginia Vickers. The father went to Texas soon after the Civil war, in which he had served throughout the period of hostilities. He served as deputy United States marshal in Texas and while filling that office was killed. His widow now resides in Kansas. Captain Vickers obtained a public school education and was employed along mechanical lines until 1898, when the same patriotic spirit that prompted his father's enlistment in the Civil war caused him to tender his services to the government at the time of the Spanish-American war, in which he served as a member of Troop L of the Rough Riders. He was afterward for three years on active duty with the Sixth Regiment of Cavalry in the Philippines and in China, and following his honorable discharge from the army, he was engaged in civil service work in Manila for fifteen years. He organized and was superintendent of the department of artesian wells, installing over eighteen hundred flowing wells in that country and establishing water plants throughout the Philippines. While thus engaged he handled appropriations to the amount of three million dollars per year in connection with the work. In October, 1915, Captain Vickers returned to the United States and established his home at Kennewick, Washington. He organized the Highlands Fruit Company, which has sixty acres planted to apples near Kennewick. Tie has since been president and manager of that company and is also identified with the Spokane Fruit Growers Company, which has its head office in Spokane and was organized in 1912. 1t is composed of fruit growers of Washington and is controlled by a board of fifteen trustees. The business was started at Kennewick in 1916 and in 1917 the company built a warehouse fifty by two hundred and fifty feet, of which fifty by one hundred and fifty feet is a frost-proof storage department. Thirty by one hundred and fifty feet of this building is two stories in height and the second story is a modern fruit-packing room. The company handled one hundred carloads of apples and fifty carloads of soft fruit in 1917. The warehouse was built by the Kennewick-Richland Warehouse Company, a separate organization, but controlled by the same people. The officers of the company are: J. W. Vickers, president; A. Lehnhard, vice-president; and A. P. Russell, secretary and treasurer, and all three are actively connected with the business. The local board of the Spokane Fruit Growers Company consists of A. Leonard, president; R. H. Briggs, secretary; and J. W. Vickers, manager. Captain Vickers has been very active in the conduct and management of the business and is thoroughly familiar with every phase of fruit production and sales in this section of the country. He is also the president of the Highlands Gas & Oil Company, which has leases on ten hundred and fifty acres of oil land. He is likewise a trustee of the Highland Water Users Association. On the 25th of June, 1910, Captain Vickers was married to Miss Iza Fisher, of Manila, who was born in Evansville, Indiana, and went to the Philippines as a nurse. They now have one child, Gladys, who is six years of age. Fraternally Captain Vickers is connected with the Masons and has attained the thirty-second degree of the Scottish Rite and crossed the sands of the desert with the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. He is also a past chancellor commander of the Knights of Pythias. His religious faith is that of the Methodist church and in political belief he is a republican. He is a progressive man, alert to every opportunity. His life's experiences have been broad and varied, making him a man of liberal culture and wide general information, and Kennewick may well be proud to number him among her citizens. Although fifty years of age, he passed the required examination and on the 18th of August, 1918, was commissioned captain in the Quartermaster's Corps and was stationed at Washington, D. C., until the armistice was signed, when he asked for a discharge, which was granted February 15, 1919. He is a personal friend of General Wood, and had the war lasted a few more weeks, would probably have been sent to France. It was a real disappointment to him that he did not get "over there." ******************************** Submitted to the Washington Bios Project in January 2008 by Jeffrey L. Elmer. Submitter has no additional information about the subject of this article.