Sacramento County
Biographies
JOHN NICHOLAS
JOHN NICHOLAS, farmer, has (sic) born
in Arendal, Norway,
November 27, 1828, a son of Terg and Karen
Nicholas. In his father’s family were four sons and one daughter, of whom
two are now living; Aaron, a brother, who resides in Norway; another brother
came to the United States when a young man and died in Chicago two months
afterward, in 1851. John’s father died in 1851,
and his mother several years previously. He, the subject of this sketch,
lived with his parents until he was fourteen years old, when he was confirmed
by the priest, according to the customs of his county, and he struck out into
the world for himself, going to sea as a cabin boy. He worked his way up
from that to the position of an able-bodied seaman during the ten years he was
on the ocean. His vessel made trips to nearly all foreign
countries. In 1849 or 1850 he obtained from the authorities of his native
country a passport that would enable him to travel in any country without being molested; and then he visited Havre, France,
and then shipped as a seaman to New York; returned to Amsterdam, then to New
York again, and Mobile. In the latter place he remained until the
following spring, when, having learned of his brother, Nels
Nicholas, being at New Orleans, he
went there in search of him; but upon arrival found that he left there three
days before. His brother died in Chicago
that year. John then spent a summer in Boston, and
visited Philadelphia, then New Orleans
again, and then spent another winter at Mobile. Then
he went up the Mississippi and Ohio
rivers to Cincinnati, thence to Cleveland
and Buffalo, and then to Chicago
to learn the particulars of his brother’s death. He returned to Buffalo
and New York,
and to Mobile for still another
winter. In the summer of 1853 he had a siege of the yellow fever. In
1854 he came to California, by way of New
York, and the Isthmus, arriving in San
Francisco in October. For three years he followed
mining at Iowa Hill, El Dorado County,
and around Grass Valley
in Nevada County,
etc.; and ever since 1857 he has followed farming on a tract which he then
purchased. All the improvements that exist upon it he himself has
made. The place is well improved and in good condition; contains 160
acres; is six miles from Sacramento and between the upper
and lower Stockton roads. Mr.
Nicholas is an industrious and honest man, a faithful and useful
citizen. He was married first in 1852 to Elizabeth Ourkirk,
a native of Holland, who died in
1879, the mother of two children, both now deceased. In 1883 he married
for his present wife Louisa Sorensen, a native of Norway,
born November 19, 1851, and came to California
in 1881. By this marriage there are two children: Elmer, born December 20,
1883, and Edwin, July 19, 1887. They also lost a daughter, Sarah
Elizabeth, who died October 13, 1886, aged one year, eight months and twenty
days.
Transcribed 9-3-07 Marilyn R. Pankey.
Source: Davis, Hon. Win. J., An Illustrated
History of Sacramento County, California. Pages 624-625.
Lewis Publishing Company. 1890.
© 2007 Marilyn R. Pankey.