JOHN G. PAINE.
JOHN G. PAINE
John G. Paine, who has been actively identified with commercial, financial and agricultural interests in western Washington, was born in Mercer, Maine, July 8, 1842. He acquired a common school education in his home town, where he was reared upon a farm. Prompted by a desire to attempt something more promising than a New England farm offered, he followed Horace Greeley's advice to go west and in 1865 arrived in Walla Walla. Soon after his arrival he secured employment in the general merchandise store of Baker & Boyer, acting as a salesman in their establishment. In 1868 he entered into partnership with his brother, F. W. Paine, in the conduct of a general store and in 1871 took over the management of a branch store in Waitsburg. Six years later, having disposed of that business, he opened a branch store in Dayton and in the meantime he served as cashier of the Columbia National Bank. After a few years of confinement in indoor life, the firm having acquired several large tracts of wheat land, he undertook the development of that property and devoted several years to wheat growing. More recently, however, he has been largely interested in the development of alfalfa land and is thus prominently connected with an industry which is proving a source of wealth to eastern Washington. Mr. Paine occupies a homelike suite of rooms in the Paine building. He is widely known in the state as a most progressive business man and his enterprise has carried him into most important business connections.
OSCAR W. BRUNTON.
Well directed business activity finds expression in the life record of Oscar W. Brunton, vice president of the Dement Brothers Company, proprietors of a large flour mill at Walla Walla. He was born in Alton, Illinois, on the 15th of March, 1868, a son of David and Margaret P. (White) Brunton. The father was a native of Pennsylvania and the mother of Tennessee, while their marriage was celebrated in Illinois. The former was a winding stair builder and became actively identified with business interests in Alton, Illinois, where he passed away in 1870. His widow afterward removed with her three children to Macon City, Missouri, and thence to Hannibal, that state, and in August, 1876 they came to Walla Walla, where she joined her sister, who was the wife of Rev. H. W. Egan, who was presiding over the Cumberland Presbyterian church at this place. Here Mrs. Brunton reared her children and continued to make her home until 1907, when she took up her residence with a daughter in Berkeley, California, where she has since resided. She is now in her eighty-seventh year and is enjoying excellent health, while in possession of all of her faculties.
Oscar W. Brunton was educated in the Walla Walla public schools and in Whitman Seminary. In his boyhood days he took up the study of telegraphy and mastered the Morse code while he was but a child. A brother being an operator, he was desirous of studying along that line but he never followed the profession as a means of livelihood. For some years in his youth he worked as a job printer in the old Journal office, and in 1884 he entered the employ of Dement Brothers in the Eureka flour mills. There he proved efficient, capable and trustworthy and in 1892 he had risen to the position of mill manager, while in 1896, upon the incorporation of the company, he became one of the members of the concern and continued as manager of the mills. In 1907 he was elected to the vice presidency of the Dement Brothers Company and remained as manager as well. Since that time he has given his attention to administrative direction and executive control as well as to the operation of the mills and has contributed much to the success of the business. There is no phase of milling operations with which he is not familiar and his long experience and capability constitute an important element in the growing success of their trade.