"Judd C. Bush, Early Local Pioneer, Dies Sunday Morning"
Judd C. Bush, 75, one of Chehalis' best known and highly respected pioneer, died at the family home on Pennsylvania avenue early Sunday morning. He had been an invalid many years. Death came shortly before 3 o'clock. The end came peacefully, as the first rays of the morning sun were breaking on the eastern horizon. Mr. Bush had suffered a stroke the previous Sunday night. During last week the family and intimate friends were aware of his critical condition.
Funeral services will be held today, Friday, at 1:30 pm at the Church of the Epiphany. O. D. Smith, rector, will officiate. The Chehalis Masonic lodge will be in charge. Mr. Bush affiliated with this historic order many years ago. He served it as its worshipful master long since. Burial will be in the family plot at Claquato. Active pall bearers will be from the Masonic lodge. The Woodmen of the World, Elks and Knights of Pythias lodges, of which Mr. Bush was also a member, will be represented officially in the list of honorary pall bearers. This also will include other personal friends and intimates of years. The body lay in state Thursday afternoon at the Sticklin Mortuary and many called to pay their last respects. Others may view it until 11:30 am today, Friday, when the casket will be closed. It will not be opened at the church.
Judd Calvin Bush was the son of Mr. and Mrs. Daniel Wesley Bush. His father, whose ancestry was of French descent, was born in Hardin county, Kentucky. His mother, Mary Elizabeth Gregg, of English and Scotch descent, was born in Edgar county, Illinois, near Paris. Mr. Bush was born near that city, May 4, 1860. A short period of his childhood, after the Civil War, was spent in Nevada. Early in 1869 his parents returned to Illinois by the Isthmus of Panama. After visiting relatives they migrated to Wilson county, Kansas. There a homestead was taken, late in the summer. A few weeks later, in mid-September, his father died of typhoid, leaving the widowed mother and three young children, Mr. Bush being the oldest. A few years later the family home was made in Iola, county seat of Allen county, to the north of Wilson.
It was in the office of the Iola Register that Mr. Bush learned the printer's trade as a boy. When about 17, after having mastered his craft, he was attracted to New Mexico, where a young friend had preceded him. In that territory, Mr. Bush worked at his trade on the daily papers in Santa Fe, Las Vegas and Albuquerque. He was in New Mexico during the stirring days when the activiites of "Billy the Kid," the Dillinger of those days, attracted national attention and when "The Kid" meta tragic end, and could relate many interesting incidents of this event.
In the early 80's Mr. Bush worked some time in Denver. In 1882 he purchased the Sidney, Neb., Telegraph. He published it several years before coming to the Pacific northwest in 1888. While looking over the country with a view to a permanent location, Mr. Bush worked at his trade on the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and Portland Oregonian. Although his early educational opportunities had been somewhat limited, Mr. Bush had attained a rare fund of knowledge at his trade, and by his reading, that proved invaluable and made of him a splendidly educated man. He was most expert and rapid at his trade. These qualities were impressed as outstanding characteristics of his later years, with others.
In the summer of 1889, Mr. Bush selected Chehalis for his home, when he purchased the Bee from Owen & Morrison. The latter's interest was first acquired, Owen's a few months later. However, in the spring of 1889 a break in health made necessary his temporary retirement from newspaper work. After spending upwards of a year in the out of doors with an engineering party on the Northern Pacific's South Bend branch, in the early 90's, he was again able to become active in a business way.
During the succeeding years, until 1924, when he was appointed postmaster at Chehalis, Mr. Bush's time was occupied at farming and in his association at various times with the Bee-Nugget in an editorial or other capacity. For several years he grew hops extensively. His crops were always in strong demand from buyers, due to fine quality and the care exercised in producing them. Dairying and general farming on two large places west of the river her developed into large enterprises. He was one of the founders of the Lewis-Pacific Dairymen's Association and served as a director and its first secretary. He took great pride in the fact that his breeding operations resulted in the development of a splendid herd of registered and high grade Holstein cattle.
During his boyhood Mr. Bush became greatly interested in hunting, fishing, athletics and other out of door sports. He continued to enjoy this type of recreation up to ten years ago when he took his last deer hunt in eastern Lewis county. He liked field hunting and duck shooting. He kept splendidly trained hunting dogs at various times. For years he was most expert as a marksman at the traps; also with a revolver and rifle. In fact, he excelled most men in his ability along these lines. Early in 1900 he took an active interest in the perpetuation of Company F, National Guard of Washington, originally organized at Chehalis during the later weeks of the Spanish-American War of 1898. Sanford Loomis was first lieutenant; the late A. S. Loomis, his brother, second lieutenant. These three men, Ed Paulson, the late S. E. Keables, the late Guy Waterbury, J. V. Bliss and others, formed a rifle team that for several years won the national Guard state championship.
Politically, Mr. Bush was a conservative, stalwart republican. He was for many years chairman of his party's county central committee. He took an active interest in congressional and state politics as a member of that party. In 1924 he was appointed postmaster here and held the office until the fall of 1926. The break in health that finally resulted in his death, made it impossible for him to give his official duties the full measure of service to which he believed the government was entitled and he resigned in November that year.
During the years Mr. Bush was active in all community affairs looking to the building of a larger, better Chehalis. He was a leader in the old Citizens' club, which later was changed to the present Chamber of commerce. He gave freely of his time and money toward any worthy enterprise along civic and industrial lines. More than a quarter of a century ago, in company with his brother, Dan W. Bush, the Bush Block on Market street, in Chehalis' choicest business district was erected by them. Jointly they aided largely in securing the first hard surface paving in the city, which was later so extensively developed. Mr. Bush's newspaper and farming experience resulted in the formation of a wide circle of sincere and lasting friends in all parts of Lewis county. He probably had a wider rural acquaintance than any other local resident. These friends of years will sincerely regret to learn of his passing.
Mr. Bush's outstanding characteristics were his absolute integrity, his high sense of honor, his punctuality in all things, his precision and the thoroughness with which anything with which he was associated was done, his sense of justness and fairness toward all. His uprightness was marked in the example he set before the community in the splendid life he led; an example the emulation of which by all would result in a better, brighter world.
Mr. Bush is survived by his widow, Mrs. Laura Gordon Bush, whom he married October 4, 1893, whose parents, Mr. and Mrs. A. F. Gordon, respected pioneers of Claquato, located her in the early 60's; a brother, Dan W. Bush; and two nieces, Mrs. George D. Prigmore of San Francisco and Mrs. Laurence M. Perrish of Seattle. During his long illness all the care and tender kindness that a devoted, loving wife could bestow on him was freely given by Mrs. Bush, who, with his other relatives and friends, will so keenly feel his loss.
Source: The Chehalis Bee-Nugget, 16 Aug 1935, page 1.
Transcribed by Diana Smith. She has no further information on this individual.