The Hall Family

In the year 1886 Jessie Hall looked over the valley and selected a part to the east side to settle. W.D. Hall remembers how he went with his father to measure land. The real estate man picked up Jessie and W.D. in a buggy and took them to the place Jessie had chosen. W.D. remembers how one of the spokes of the wheel was painted white. When they arrived at what was to be one corner of the plot of land, the real estate man started to count the times the wheel turned around.When he had gone the right number of times he stopped and drove a stake. Then he went to each corner until he measured out the 40 acres. This ranch was in the Madison School area.

The first year they planted wheat. Then Mr. Hall met a man named George A. Cowles who helped him plant 30 acres in raisin grapes. They soon found the 40 acres too small for the family and W.D. left home to make his own living.

W.D. Hall then worked for other people building homes and stores. Some of the places he built were the old drug store and shoe shop. In 1897 W.D. Hall formed a partnership with Charles Kessler and they bought 2-1/2 acres of land from about $60.00 per acre. Here they started a lumber yard.

In December 1898 they started a 4 page newspaper that was published weekly. They called it Once-a-Week.

By 1905 W.D. Hall bought Kessler's share of the lumber yard which now had a metal and machine shop.

The W.D. Halls had seven children. Their names where Rexford Luther Hall, Julian Erwin Hall, Grant Wilson Hall, Valeria Winifred Hall (Almon), Majarie Eleanor Hall (Roether), Nellie Grant Hall (Fansher) and Lola Florence Hall (Roether) Rexford Hall was President of the W.D. Hall Lumber Co.