LOUIS GOTTSHALL
LOUIS GOTTSHALL, of the firm Scotchler & Gottshall, real estate agents of Oakland and Berkeley, was born in Grant county, Wisconsin, July 5, 1850, the youngest child of Christian and Caroline Gottshall, both natives of Germany. Soon after their marriage they emigrated to America, settling first in Pennsylvania in 1825, where the father worked at coal-mining. In 1839 they moved into Wisconsin, where he worked for some years in the lead mines and became the owner of a farm. In 1851 he came to California and worked for some time in placer-mining, but his chief success was in quartz-mining in Virginia City, Nevada, where he accumulated quite a sum of money. Meanwhile his wife and three children came out by way of New York and Panama, arriving in San Francisco, July 27, 1859. The oldest child, Henry, born in Pennsylvania in 1826, had come out with the father. He is now a resident of Bodie, California, and still interested in mining. One daughter, Caroline, the wife of Joseph Kirkenbush, a farmer of Grant county, Wisconsin, remained behind. Martin, another brother, born in 1838, now a carpenter and builder, is a resident of Southern California. Catherine, a sister, is now Mrs. George Scheibe, of Oakland. The father died in Virginia City in 1866, aged sixty-six; the mother in Sacramento, in 1870, aged about sixty-two. The grandparents Gottshall lived to about the age of ninety, and the maternal grandfather also lived to old age.
Louis Gottshall went to school first in Wisconsin,
and from 1859 to 1866 in Sacramento, a part of the time in Hunt's Academy. The family resided in Sacramento, the
climate of Nevada City, where the father's business interests chiefly lay,
proving unhealthful to the mother. On
the death of his father, Louis began to earn wages as a clerk in a dry-goods
store, remaining in one store over nine years.
In October, 1885, he came to Berkeley and entered a general store where
he remained about six months. He then
went into business on his own account with a partner, under the style of
Gottshall & Stoddart, dealers in general merchandise, which, however,
lasted but five months, when he formed the firm of Gottshall & McClain in
the same year, 1876. Mr. Gottshall was
elected Town Treasurer in 1878 and was annually re-elected until 1882, when he
was elected Public Administrator of Alameda county, serving in that office to
January 2, 1887. He then went into the
insurance business under the style of Gottshall & Byrnes, which continued
to July, 1887, when he formed a partnership with Mr. Scotchler, under the style
of Scotchler & Gottshall, real estate agents.
Mr. Gottshall was married in Sacramento
August 1, 1872, to Miss Anna Belle Cassell, born in Ohio and a resident of
California since 1854. Her mother, Mrs.
Mary E. Cassell, is still living. The
children of Mr. and Mrs. Louis Gottshall are:
Harry Burton, born August 4, 1873; Lavina Mabel, August 23, 1875; Amy
Blanche, May 30, 1881; Edward Louis, April 5, 1884; Grace May, in 1888. Mr. Gottshall is a member of University
Lodge, No. 258, F. & A.M., of Oakland Chapter, No. 26, R.A.M.; of Berkeley
Lodge, No. 270, I.O.O.F., and of University Lodge, No. 88, A.O.U.W.
Transcribed by
Pamela Storm Wolfskill.
Source: "The
Bay of San Francisco," Vol. 1, pages 577-578, Lewis Publishing Co, 1892.
© 2004 Pamela Storm
Wolfskill.