A native of Ireland, Anthony Kilkenny was born in County Mayo in 1840, of parents who gave to him an education in those essential things of life in which work, industry and thrift largely enter. After his schooling was completed he worked in his native land until he was twenty-five years old, and in the meantime he determined to come to the United States. The port of Philadelphia was reached after a tempestuous voyage of several weeks. He went almost immediately to New Jersey, and for three years lived there, learning much of the ways and manners of the people with whom he had come to live. At the end of three years he came to California on a sailing vessel by way of the Isthmus of Panama. From San Francisco he journeyed to Jamestown and engaged in mining for a time and then in viticulture and horticulture. Later he went to the San Joaquin Valley and obtained work with a threshing machine outfit. Here for two years land was leased and barley raised, and he also engaged in the transfer of sacks of copper from freight teams to shipping for a portion of the time.