Brandon Road in Fallbrook is named for the Brandon family, early residents of Fallbrook. The old Brandon House still stands at the west corner of today’s S. Brandon Road and E. Alvarado St.
Albert Brandon had enlisted in the Union Army at the age of 19 during the Civil War. He became a sergeant of Company I in the Wisconsin 25th Infantry, serving at Vicksburg and in other campaigns. After the war, Albert returned to Wisconsin to marry Mary J. Cairns in 1867 and they started a family. Albert was a farmer, first in Wisconsin and later in Iowa. Mary would bore them 12 children.
In 1910 the Brandons were in Fallbrook. Albert, known as ‘Bert’ had a home farm on acreage he had purchased just east of the town. In 1911, Albert, with his youngest sons, Frank and Everett, built a house here from the redwood lumber of the razed Fallbrook Hotel that once stood on the NW corner of Alvarado and Main. Frank and Everett Brandon would become respected builders in early Fallbrook.
Today, the frame from the original construction is still recognizable. See the accompanying picture. A private business currently occupies the building on the corner of Brandon Road and Alvarado St.
The Brandon’s son, Roy, lived next door on E. Alvarado in 1920. Today, Brandon Road runs between Albert’s and his son Roy’s home. A modern doctor’s office now sits on the old site of Roy Brandon’s home.
Albert Brandon died Christmas Day in 1923 at the age of 80.
Mary Brandon, known to many around town as ‘Grandma Brandon’, continued her deep involvement with the Fallbrook Women’s Christian Temperance Union (W.C.T.U.), often holding meetings in her home. She was a charter member of the Fallbrook Women’s Club and one of the first members of the Fallbrook Garden Club. She passed away in 1941 at the age of 91.
Albert and Mary Brandon are buried in the Oddfellows Cemetery.
Tom Frew,
FHS Historian
