ZEBULON GARDNER 

Zebulon Gardner, deceased, was for years one of the most prominent men in Sacramento business circles, and a man of enterprise and integrity, universally esteemed and respected. He was a native of Exeter, Rhode Island, and the old homestead where he was born July 10, 1810, has been in the family name for 150 years, and is now owned by Senator Herbert Gardner of Rhode Island. He spent his early boyhood days on the old homestead, but the day he was twenty-one years old he ran away from home with 50 cents in his pocket, given him by his mother, determined without friends or money to fight fortune for himself and on his own responsibility. At Fall River, Massachusetts, he obtained employment as laborer in Cook, Borden & Co.’s box factory and planing-mill, and worked his way up, step by step, to the position of superintendent. He was with this firm sixteen years. The discovery of gold in California turned his attention in that direction, and in 1849 he left New York for Panama on a steamer, taking with him two men, whose fares he paid. Crossing the Isthmus they learned that the steamer that was to take them had broken down. A number of them chartered an old sailing vessel, the bark Clarissa (Captain Lamence), in which they resumed the voyage. The craft drifted about on the Pacific for sixty-eight days, forty days on short rations, and on July 2, 1850, they landed in San Francisco. Mr. Gardner went at once to the mines near Auburn, with those whose passage he had paid. Finding, however, that there were other vocations more profitable than mining, he came to Sacramento and bought out the St. John lumber yard, which he thereafter conducted. He extended his business interests beyond this limit, however, and built a flour mill at Knight’s Landing, Yolo County. While on a trip up there on the steamer George B. McClellan, August 23, 1861, with coin and checks to pay off grain bills, he was killed by the explosion of the steamer, when within two miles of the landing. The incidents attending the case were peculiarly affecting. It was the custom for intending passengers to book their names with the clerk the day before the day of leaving, and if any were missing, a whistle would be blown as a signal for them to hasten. On the day appointed Mrs. Gardner was sick, and begged her husband not to go. But after the steamer had blown her whistle twice, he kissed his wife and hastened to the landing, just being able to board the vessel before her plank was taken up. His remains only were found, ten days after the explosion. Mrs. Gardner’s death followed as the result of the sad accident. Mr. Gardner was a prominent man in many directions in this city. He was a charter member of Union Lodge, I.O.O.F., the first lodge of the order in this city. In politics he was a Republican. He was at all times active in church work. He was identified with the Baptist Church, and gave the lumber for the old church of that denomination.

 

Transcribed by Debbie Gramlick.