Webber was
born in Bucyrus, Ohio in 1834 and came to California in 1860. In 1868, he
opened a drugstore and apothecary at Eleventh and Broadway. He carried a best
selling women’s fragrance call “Orange Flower Cologne,” which the Oakland
Tribune called “all the rage.”
He was elected
to the Oakland City Council in 1872 and served as president for two terms
(1873–1874). He was named to succeed Henry Durant as Mayor on February 1, 1875,
and was elected to a full term on March 1, 1875. In 1876, he became one of the
first people to warn the East Bay that it would have to find its own water
supply. At the time, Anthony Chabot’s San Leandro Reservoir was providing
adequate water to Oakland, but Webber and others suggested that an aqueduct be
built connecting the Sierra to Oakland.
He could
have been easily reelected, but opted to head to Nevada to pursue mining
interests. He returned to become the assistant appraiser and deputy collector
at the Custom House in San Francisco.
On January
5, 1901 he suffered a stroke while on business in San Francisco and taken to
St. Luke’s Hospital. He died there on January 8, 1901 and is buried at Mountain
View.
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