Daniel Isaac Hancock, another well known and prosperous agriculturist of the famous San Joaquin county, is owner of a beautiful and valuable ranch of one hundred and sixty aces located in the vicinity of Waterloo. Born in the state of Indiana, August 31, 1851, at the age of ten he was brought by his father and step-mother across the plains from Iowa to California, that journey, made with ox teams and lasting for nearly six months, forming a well defined series of recollections in his mind. He has therefore practically grown up with his section of California and has been identified with its agricultural progress throughout his active career.

His parents were Sampson B. and Margaret (Thompson) Hancock, his father a native of Indiana. He was three years old when he lost his mother. At the age of two he was taken by his parents to Lee county, Iowa, where was the home until the removal to California. Sampson B. Hancock located his family near Waterloo, in San Joaquin county, in 1862, and he lived there until his demise, March 28, 1898, that being the sixty-eighth anniversary of his birth. He served as a trustee of the Madison school district, and was well known in his community. In politics he was Republican, and fraternally was affiliated with Scio Lodge No. 102, I. O. O. F., at Linden. He was twice married, and five children survive, namely: Eliza, wife of Warren Thayer, in the state of Washington; Martha, wife of M. Haynes, of San Francisco; Arthur R., in San Francisco; Thomas B., in Hanford, this state; and Daniel Isaac.

Mr. Hancock was reared to man's estate in San Joaquin county, and most of his early education was received in that county. Since school days his time and attention have been almost exclusively devoted to agricultural pursuits, in which he has gained a gratifying degree of material success. he was married, September 29, 1881, to Miss Louisa Thrush, who was born in Lee county, Iowa, a daughter of George and Dora E. (Ebeling) Thrush, her father being a resident of San Joaquin county, and her mother died March 27, 1895, aged sixty-three years, one month and twenty-one days. Mrs. Hancock, when a small girl, in the sixties, came across the plains, the party driving mule and ox teams, and after residing at various places in the state her parents finally located, early in the seventies, near Waterloo, where her father still lives. Mr. and Mrs. Hancock have one daughter, Della M., who is a student in the Stockton high school. Mr. Hancock has been a trustee of his home school district of Madison. He is affiliated with Scio Lodge No. 102, I. O. O. F., at Linden, and is a Republican in politics.

Source: History of the New California Its Resources and People, Volume II

The Lewis Publishing Company - 1905
Edited by Leigh H. Irvine