One of the children of Caleb and Nancy Dorroh was a son named John Richard Dorroh, born 10 January 1861 in Pinkleeville, Kentucky. [Johnston p 381] He attended medical school at Louisville and at Miami University in Ohio. Caleb Dorroh didn't approve of his son's medical ambitions, wanting him instead to stay on the farm. The father had refused to buy John a new suit for his graduation from medical school. It may be that young Dr. Dorroh came to California to escape his father. At any rate, young Doctor Dorroh arrived at Angels Camp, Calaveras County, California in the 1880s. Caleb and Nancy eventually followed him to California. They died at Angels Camp: Nancy 7 April 1909, Caleb in 1910. [Johnston pp 362, 376, 381-382]

Angels Camp was founded in 1848 and became famous in 1865 when Mark Twain published the short story "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County," a story Twain had heard Simon Wheeler tell in the barroom of the Angel Hotel. Since 1928, the big event of the year at Angels is the annual Jumping Frog Jubilee, when people come from far and wide to see whose frog can jump the farthest. Angels Camp may be the only city in the world with a statue of a frog standing at one of its main intersections. Main Street in Angels is now part of State Route 49, the highway that runs from Chilcoot south to Oakhurst, connecting many Gold Rush settlements. It was designated Route 49 in honor of the '49ers, those who came to the area in 1849 in search of gold.

Dr. Dorroh in front of his office in Angels Camp

Dr. Dorroh married Kate Moran 4 September 1890. Her family approved of this match. Doctor Dorroh had a large house on the Main Street of Angels Camp, and he practiced at the hospital right next door. The two buildings still stand at this writing, overlooking Angels Creek. Both have been converted into apartment houses and are not in good repair. He also owned a pharmacy on Main Street, closer to the center of town. The building that housed the pharmacy still stands. I imagine that in Doctor Dorroh's day, its interior resembled the restored pharmacy in Columbia State Historic Park, not far away. He was, for a time, the company doctor for the Utica Mine, which played a large role in the history of Angel's Camp. Edward Leonard's A Brief History of Angels Camp records that "the year 1894 was a bad year for accidents in Angels Camp. Almost daily accidents occurred which caused the Utica mine owners to erect a hospital to care for the injured. It was a two-story , 40- by 40-foot building 'equipped with toilets and wash stands,' and housed eight patients on each floor. Dr. Dorroh was in charge."

The Dorroh home in Angels was always full of people: patients, neighbors, boarders, and especially cousins. Their daughter Terese was close to her first cousins, the eight children of Kate's younger brother Tom. When they were children, they played together a lot, and they thought nothing of sleeping in a roomful of children.

Dr. Dorroh's daughter Terese recalled the flood of 1909, which caused the Cosgrove carriage and blacksmith shop to float down Main Street, right past the Dorroh home. She was afraid her own house would follow it! Leonard's book has a photograph of this on page 37.

The brothers-in-law John Dorroh and Tom Moran together bought a ranch bisected by the Milton-Farmington road. They divided the ranch between them, using the road as boundary. There was a house on each side of the road, and each brother took possession of one of the houses. Their widows and descendants didn't get along as well as the brothers-in-law had, resulting in some unpleasant squabbles that Grandma Phil doesn't like to recall. Some of that ranch was still in the family at the end of the century, and some relatives are buried in the hilltop cemetery at Milton.

Doctor and Mrs. Dorroh had two children. Their son John Scribner, who was known by his middle name, was born 14 August 1891. He married Millie Cuneo. They have numerous descendants. Scribner died in 1960. A daughter, Terese Beatrice Dorroh, was born 28 January 1894 at Angels Camp.

Doctor Dorroh, tolerant in religious matters, allowed his children to be raised Catholics although he had been raised a Baptist. He is quoted by his daughter as having said "I have held the hands of people of every religion and color as they died, and I have seen no difference in the way they die."

Doctor Dorroh was a Mason: photo of Bear Mountain Masonic Lodge, Angels Camp, and mention of John Richard Dorroh as Junior Warden in 1898

John Richard Dorroh died at Angels Camp in November 1911, at age forty-nine. His widow was forty-eight, his daughter seventeen. [Johnston p 381]

Katherine Moran's last years were spent with her daughter's family in San Leandro. She died there on 26 January, 1937 and was buried at the cemetery at Altaville (now part of Angels Camp), in a family plot where also are buried her husband, her mother, and her brother.

email john@jrhuber.com