This house was built by James Calvin “Cal” Tobias, an attorney and later judge in Crawford County, and he presented it to his wife Amina Monnett Tobias. Amina was a younger sister of Mervin Monnette. (The last name spelling changed during this generation and varies among 12 children of Abraham and Catherine Monnett). Mervin’s gift was made to the community after his gold strike in Nevada, after which he moved to Los Angeles. When aunt Amina and uncle Cal made plans to retire to Glendale, California, Mervin bought the property and made the donation. Mervin’s former house stood on West Rensselaer Street and became a funeral home. Incidentally, the Tobias family descendants of Cal and Amina continue to operate the same lemon farm in Saticoy, California, that Deane Tobias established in the late teens.
–Contributed by Stuart Haley, a Monnett Family Historian.
