Sacramento County
Biographies
SEELY DeKAY
SEELY DeKAY,
farmer, was born in Sussex County, New
Jersey, in 1820. In 1848 he moved to Republican,
Ohio, and a short time afterward, in 1852, came to California,
overland, being three months on the way. The Pawnee Indians stole some of
his cattle, but fortunately he recovered them. Arriving in Sacramento
with a few head of cattle, he sold them. Was then employed by William
Muldrow for six months, and then rented twenty-five acres of land and began
gardening. Two years afterward he bought three span
of mules and commenced teaming over the Sierra Nevada
Mountains, and this business he
followed for about twenty years. Finally he bought the ranch of 480 acres
where he is now living and where he is raising all of kind of stock, hay and grain. William
DeKay, father of Seely, was
also a native of New Jersey and died in that State; and his wife Rachel, nee
Hamilton, born also in New Jersey, died in Republican, Ohio. Mr. C. S.
DeKay married Jane Pitcher, who was born in London,
England, in 1829, and
they have one child, Guy P.
Transcribed 9-12-07 Marilyn R. Pankey.
Source: Davis, Hon. Win. J., An Illustrated
History of Sacramento County, California. Page 636.
Lewis Publishing Company. 1890.
© 2007 Marilyn R. Pankey.