The following is from a work-in-progress about the history of Fullerton. You can support my ongoing research and writing on Patreon.
John A. Moore was born in Barton County, Missouri in 1884, three years before his brother James, but James was the first to come out to the west coast, at age 17.
In 1906, John joined his brother in Rialto, in San Bernardino County, where they worked for a year on ranches. Next they moved to Imperial Valley, where they bought land and developed an alfalfa ranch, which they later sold.
In 1911, James moved to Fullerton, soon followed by his brother, and they opened the first cement pipe-yard here, The Moore Bros. Company located on West Santa Fe Avenue.
The cement pipes they made were essential for irrigating the large fields of Fullerton and surrounding areas.
In 1918, during World War I, James enlisted and served in the Three Hundred Nineteenth Engineers, though he never was sent overseas. He was honorably discharged in 1919 and he returned to resume the cement business in Fullerton.
In 1919 James sold his interest in the West Santa Fe yard to his brother, E.W. Moore, and in the spring of 1920, with his brother John he again created a cement pipe business at 221 East Santa Fe Avenue. The firm not only manufactured cement pipes, but also installed them for irrigation.
They also did cement curbing, gutters, and foundations.
“The cement industry, carried on as it is today with the aid of scientific research, has come to mean a great deal in the development of new towns and their outlying neighborhoods,” biographer Samuel Armor wrote in 1921. “Orange County is to be congratulated on such an establishment as that of the Moore Bros. Company.”
Source:
History of Orange County, California: with biographical sketches of the leading men and women of the county who have been identified with its earliest growth and development from the early days to the present by Samuel Armor. Los Angeles Historic Record Co, 1921.
Fullerton History 