Sacramento County

Biographies

GEORGE C. JENSEN

Sacramento is fortunate in having its educational interests in the hands of men who are competent, thorough and progressive. In this classification belongs George C. Jensen, assistant superintendent of the city schools and a native son of California. He was born in Humboldt county October 25, 1882, and pursued his early education in Boone’s preparatory school at Berkeley. Later he was graduated from the University of California, winning his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1911 and his Master’s degree in 1912. He gained the Flood fellowship at the university and was prominent in college circles. In 1913 he went to Elko county, Nevada, where he occupied the position of English teacher in the high school until 1914, when he was made principal of the school, there remaining until 1919. He then became principal of the high school in Eureka, Humboldt county, his work there covering the senior and junior high schools and the junior college. In 1926 he was appointed a director of research for the California Council of Education, with the California Teachers Association in San Francisco. In 1927 he came to Sacramento as principal of the senior high school and in July 1929 was advanced to his present position as superintendent of the city schools, having charge of the secondary schools – the junior college, the senior high school, the junior high schools, the continuation high school, the evening school, and adult education. The steps in his orderly progression are easily discernible. He has made continuous progress owing to the steady development of his powers and his utilization of the opportunities which have come his way. In the summer of 1929 he occupied the position of director of the State Teachers College at Arcata, California. During his college days he became a member of the Phi Delta Kappa and he now has membership in the National Education Association and the California Teachers Association and is vice president of the California Society for Secondary Education.

Mr. Jensen was married in 1913 to Miss Myrtle Hendee, a native of Michigan, and they have four children: Alice May, Roy Hendee, Florence Ruth and George Arthur. They occupy an enviable position in those social circles where intelligence and true worth are accepted as the passports into good society. During the World war period Mr. Jensen held the rank of captain in the Home Guard in Nevada for three years. He is a blue lodge Mason and has membership in the Sacramento Rotary Club but devotes the greater part of his time and attention to educational work and is regarded as a writer and educator of note, having contributed many interesting and instructive articles on educational subjects to various magazines.

Transcribed by Debbie Walke Gramlick.

Source: Wooldridge, J.W. Major History of the Sacramento Valley California, Vol. 2 pgs. 351-352. The Pioneer Historical Publishing Co. Chicago 1931.

Sacramento County Biographies