Los Angeles County
Biographies
NEHEMIAH BLACKSTOCK
BLACKSTOCK,
NEHEMIAH, Soldier, Counselor and Banker, Los Angeles, California,
was born near Asheville, North
Carolina, September 29, 1846. He is descended of an old Scott-Irish
Southern family, being the son of James G. Blackstock,
M. D., and Elizabeth Ann (Ball) Blackstock. He married Abbie
Smith of Newport, Tennessee,
September 25, 1868, and to them were born ten
children, eight of whom are now living.
Mr. Blackstock received his education in private schools of his
native State prior to the Civil War and at the conclusion of that struggle, in
which he served the Confederacy, studied under a private tutor. This was during the years 1865-68 and, in
addition to a general literary course, read for the law.
Upon the
completion of his own education he followed the vocation of a schoolmaster,
teaching a country school near Newport, Tennessee,
during the seasons of 1868 and 1869. In
the latter year he was admitted to the Bar of Tennessee and to the Bar of the
Supreme Court of the United States,
and in 1870 moved to Warrensburg, Missouri. There he had a warm friend in General Francis
M. Cockrell, afterwards United States Senator and member of the Isthmian Canal
Board, and it was upon the motion of this famous Missourian that Mr. Blackstock was admitted to the Bar
of that State.
Mr. Blackstock practiced in the State and Federal Courts of
Missouri for three and a half years and in 1875 moved to Los Angeles, and he
has made his home there and in Ventura ever since. He remained in the city only a brief time at
first and then moved to Ventura County, California,
shortly after the organization of that county. He practiced law successfully in Ventura
for about thirty years, and there, in 1897, Mr. Blackstock
was elected State Railroad Commissioner and served four years. His administration was one of the most
important in the history of the commission, that body having to deal with
various important policies, including the fixing of passenger, freight and oil
rates on the railroads of the State.
These measures were the subject of extensive litigation, but ultimately
were upheld and form the basis of numerous latter-day reforms in the
transportation methods and charges prevailing in California.
Governor Pardee, in the year 1905, chose Mr. Blackstock
for the office of State Banking Commissioner, to fill the unexpired term of Guy
B. Barham, and he at that time changed his residence
from Ventura to Los Angeles. So satisfactorily did he discharge the duties
of the office, he was reappointed for the full term of four years. He held the office for about two and a half
years more, resigning to enter the banking business.
He became
associated with the Merchants’ Bank and Trust Company of Los
Angeles as Vice president and Trust Officer and served
as such until April 1, 1910, when he resigned as Trust Officer. He still remains a Director and Vice
President.
In the early part
of 1911 Mr. Blackstock organized the International
Indemnity Company, an indemnity, bonding and burglary insurance company, which
has its headquarters in Los Angeles. He holds the office of President and Chief
Counsel of the company and continues a general legal practice.
Mr. Blackstock’s military career was quite as brilliant as has
been his later work in the realms of law and finance. At the outbreak of the Civil War he enlisted
in the Twenty-Sixth North Carolina Cavalry and before it went into active
service he transferred to the First South Carolina Regular Artillery and served
with that regiment until the close of the war.
He was with his command in all of its battles, these including numerous
engagements in the vicinity of Charleston. He surrendered with Johnson’s army at Greensboro,
N. C., and marched home, two hundred miles on foot, but immediately joined a
company of rangers, remnants of his old regiment, under command of Lieutenant
Simpson. They started overland to join
E. Kirby Smith in Louisiana, intending, with a large
force of ex-Confederates, to tender their services to Maximillian
in Mexico, but before reaching Louisiana
news came of the surrender of General Smith and his forces; also receiving
unfavorable news from Mexico,
the company was disbanded and he returned home to Columbus,
N. C. Soon afterward he crossed into Tennessee
where he began the study of law.
Mr. Blackstock is a Republican in politics. He is a prominent Mason, a member of the Los
Angeles Bar Association, and of the National Geographical Society. His principal club is the Union League.
Transcribed 6-26-08
Marilyn R. Pankey.
Source: Press
Reference Library, Western Edition Notables of the West, Vol. I, Page 84,
International News Service, New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles,
Boston, Atlanta. 1913.
© 2008 Marilyn R. Pankey.
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