"Portrait & Biographical Record of the Willamette Valley Oregon."  Chapman 
Publishing Company, 1903. p. 1122.
 
BRUNO C. VITUS

     The road to success, with its innumerable windings, furnishes a
never-ending theme to the old and young, the latter because they desire, and the
former because their own course still charms with its gain, or endears with its
sorrow and misfortune. Each succeeds in his own way, yet certain underlying
principles light the careers of the truly successful. These same principles lead
more often through hard and disappointing ways, as many right in our own midst
might testify, and were one to select an example of the truth of the saying it
were impossible to find a better than that furnished by a whole family, banded
together and working their mutual benefit, and that one in Lane county. The
family referred to is that of Augustus J. F. Vitus, himself one of the most
prominent of the pioneers, and the father of sons who would scorn the idea of
failure in life.
     Bruno C. Vitus, the second child of the five sons and three daughters of
Augustus J. F. Vitus, was born in Dunkirk, N. Y., December 17, 1852, and his
removal to Philadelphia, Pa., followed not many months later. He was twelve
years old when the family located in Springfield, Ill., where he attended school
for nine years, and then accompanied his parents to Breckenridge, Mo., in 1873.
Long years before, the sons and father had established a sort of co-operative
existence, inspired by peculiarly strong family ties, and the harmonious
blending of dispositions and aspirations. They had not been successful in
Missouri, and when they arrived in Oregon in 1878 the family assets consisted of
thirty-two dollars and a wonderful amount of determination. A cook-stove was
purchased for thirty dollars, some tinware for the remaining two dollars, and a
sack of flour was purchased on credit. It was necessary for all hands to start
out at once to earn money for the necessities of life, and father and sons
succeeded in finding work on the surrounding farms during the first summer. That
fall they rented a farm, and went in debt for a considerable amount, the
following year blasting their expectations, owing to rust on the wheat. They
were obliged to borrow $4,000. having fifteen per cent interest, and the drain
of such an expenditure, even with the most favorable crops, can be imagined, but
hardly appreciated. Nevertheless, this difficulty was overcome by pluck and
perseverance, and in time the sum of $25,000 was paid in full on the farm. After
getting started this was comparatively easy, and they often made as high as
$13,000 a year on grain and stock. For sixteen years father and four sons worked
together on the six hundred and ninety-five acres, their name standing for all
that was reliable and substantial in business, and fine and honorable in
character.
     In 1894 Mr. Vitus left the home farm and with his earnings bought his
present farm of three hundred and twenty-seven acres two and a half miles
northeast of Springfield. This by no means represents the whole of his
investments, for he owns fifty lots in an addition to the city of Eugene on the
south and has other property scattered over the county. For his first wife Mr.
Vitus married, in 1894, Theresa Kimmel, who lived only six years after her
marriage. The present Mrs. Vitus was formerly Dorothy Blume, daughter of John F.
and Henrietta (Kriesel) Blume, who was married in 1900, and who is the mother of
two children, Maurice Bruno and Cosima Dorothy. The Vitus home is a pleasant and
hospitable one, surrounded by well kept lawns, and outhouses and fences of
modern and substantial make. The farm is all valley land, and Mr. Vitus devotes
the greater part to stock and hog raising. He is a Republican in politics, and
is fraternally associated with the Eugene Lodge of Elks. Personally and from a
business standpoint, Mr. Vitus exerts a wide influence in Lane county, his
reputation resting upon his own individual efforts, rather than upon any dignity
and honor cast by his capable and prominent father. He is broadminded,
enterprising and public-spirited, fostering education, morality and integrity.
     
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Submitted to the Oregon Bios. Project in March 2007 by Diana Smith.
Submitter has no additional information about the person(s) or family mentioned
above.