San
Joaquin County
Biographies
CHARLES ALBERT JAHANT
The annals of San Joaquin County
pioneer history would not be complete without the story of the life of Peter F.
Jahant and his son, Charles Albert, who passed away on July 25, 1918. Charles Albert Jahant was born on his father’s
ranch one mile north of Acampo, April 21, 1874, and was the third oldest in a
family of eight children. Peter Jahant
was born in France in 1827 and when he was about six months old his parents
came to the United States and settled in Akron, Ohio; he was one of a family of
eleven children. At the age of
twenty-three he started for California across the plains with mule teams,
arriving about the first of July, 1850.
Arriving in California he had five cents in his pocket and he set about
to find work to do; after hunting for work all day, and having nothing to eat,
he finally determined to seek advice. He
went to Dr. Sargent, of Sargent Brothers, who kept a store, and told of his
condition, whereupon he was told to help himself to whatever he wanted and that
he could pay when he could, as was the custom of the country in those
days. Dr. Sargent also gave him some
work to do and at the end of four days he had a chance to go to the mines,
where he remained about two months, then went to Sacramento and with his
savings bought a mule team, but after two months he was taken ill with cholera,
the expense of which took all his hard earnings and also his team, and when he
recovered he was again penniless. After
that he returned to mining on the Yuba until the stormy wet winter of 1852-53,
when he returned to Sacramento, which he found inundated, and finally settled
in San Joaquin County, where his brother Victor lived, and where he took up
Government land. In 1865 he sold his
place to his brother and removed to Stockton, where he bought a livery stable,
in which business he continued until 1871.
He then returned to his old neighborhood and bought 540 acres of
valuable land, and in 1885 he erected a handsome residence. In 1867 he was married to Miss Susan Maley, of Irish descent, but reared in Boston,
Massachusetts. He passed away in 1911,
at the age of eighty-four years.
Charles Albert Jahant was educated
in the schools of Acampo and Stockton and assisted his father on the home
place. At his father’s death the home
place was divided among the heirs and our subject received as his portion
eighty acres; later he purchased sixty acres, making 140 acres, 130 acres in
vineyard and the balance devoted to an orchard.
On March 12, 1901, in Lodi, Mr.
Jahant was married to Miss Marian Hutchins, a native of Lodi, and a daughter of
John and Anna (Nevin) Hutchins, the latter born in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. John Hutchins was a native of Canada and in
1853 crossed the plains to California, the journey consuming six months, and
with four associates he bought the site of the present thriving city of
Lodi. He raised grain for many years and
later planted one of the first commercial vineyards in this district. Mr. Jahant passed away on July 25, 1918, in
the prime of his manhood and his death came as a shock to his family and the
community, where he was highly esteemed.
Mrs. Jahant, who is a member of the Lodi Parlor, N. D. G. W., makes her
home at 24 West Lodi Avenue.
Transcribed by Gerald Iaquinta.
Source: Tinkham, George
H., History of San Joaquin County, California , Pages
1075-1076. Los Angeles, Calif.: Historic
Record Co., 1923.
© 2011 Gerald Iaquinta.
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