San Joaquin County
Biographies
NELSON McCUEN
NELSON McCUEN, assistant
superintendent of the Stockton Combined Harvester and Agricultural Works, was
born in North Gare, Ontario, March 10, 1837, a son of George and Sophia
(DeLancet) McCuen, both natives of Canada. The father, who was of Scotch parentage
and engaged during mature life chiefly in farming and lumbering, lived to the
age of seventy-five; and the mother was seventy-three at her death. Grandfather
David and Mary (Patterson) McCuen raised a large family, and lived to an
advanced age, the husband being over seventy-five. Uncle Nelson McCuen, now
living in Seattle, Washington, is engaged in active superintendence of his
blacksmith shop, at the age of seventy-five. Grandfather Lewis DeLancet had
been an officer in the French army before coming to Canada, where he was
married to Miss Mary Jane Schneider, by birth a German, but raised in Vermont.
They had twenty-two children, most of whom grew to maturity. Mr. DeLancet owned
a saw-mill and was extensively engaged in lumbering, and was a man of great personal
vigor to the last. He was killed by falling from a scaffold while at work on a
building, at the age of seventy-nine, and the wife lived to the age of
seventy-five.
The subject of this sketch was taken by
his parents, in 1840, to St. Lawrence County, New York, where the father
purchased a farm near Potsdam. There he received the usual common-school
education, and when of proper age helped to clear the woodland farm and raise
the crops, remaining on the home place uninterruptedly until 1856. He then went
to Minnesota, where he bought a claim to some land, which he sold the following
year and returned to his old home.
He was married, in Potsdam, October 22,
1857, to Miss Altha Shaw, born in that town, May 22, 1837, a daughter of Reuel
and Catherine (Earle) Shaw. The father, a native of Vermont, afterward a farmer
of St. Lawrence County, New York, came to California in 1869, and settled in
San Leandro, Alameda County, with his wife and youngest daughter. He died at
the age of eighty-five, and the mother, born in Rome, New York, about 1815, is
still living.
Mr. Nelson McCuen continued at farm work
after his marriage until he enlisted, in May, 1861 in the Sixteenth New York
Volunteer Infantry. He was wounded at the battle of Bull Run, July 22, 1861,
and was discharged in August, 1862, because he was unfit for service on account
of his wound. He re-enlisted in December, 1863, in the Eleventh New York
Cavalry, and served until the close of the war, being mustered out in August,
1865. His brother, Lewis McCuen, served in the Nineteenth New York, and his
brother David in a New Hampshire regiment.
After being mustered out Mr. McCuen went
to learn the trade of house-carpenter, and was so engaged until 1867, when he
changed his line of work to that of millwright until 1869. He then left
Potsdam, New York, for California, with his wife and three children, and on his
arrival in this State settled at San Leandro. He then went to work for Baker
& Hamilton, of the Benicia Agricultural Works, in 1870, serving one year at
the bench. In 1871 he was appointed foreman of the agricultural works, and
filled that position until 1883. On the invitation of one of the directors of
the Stockton Combined Harvester and Agricultural Works he came to this city in
1883, and was made general superintendent of the works, holding that place
until the consolidation with the Houser Works, when another superintendent was
appointed. He then returned to the bench, working thereat until the autumn of
1889, when he went to work for the Central Pacific Railroad, at Oakland, as
train inspecting carpenter. In November, 1889, he was invited back by the
Stockton Combined Harvester and Agricultural Works, and took charge here
January 9, 1890, as assistant superintendent.
Mr. McCuen joined the A. O. U. W., in San
Leandro, in 1877, and is now a member of Pacific Lodge, No. 6, of Oakland. Mr.
and Mrs. McCuen are members of the First Presbyterian Church of this city, and
Mr. McCuen was trustee of the same about 1886 and 1887. They have five living
children, the three eldest being born in Potsdam, New York: George Hermas, born
August 6, 1858, now a machinist in the Pacific Improvement Shops of the Central
Pacific Railroad, in Oakland, was married at San Leandro, August 6, 1884, and
has one child, Howard, born April 1, 1888; Mary Belle, born in May, 1868, was
married, September 1, 1888, to Thomas Story, of Oakland, and has one child,
Earle Nelson, born July 18, 1889; Adelbert Reuel, born December 19, 1866, is a
machinist in a sash, door and blind factory in Oakland; Frank Augustus, born in
San Leandro, California, February 10, 1871, is a dry-goods clerk in Oakland;
Allen Nelson, also born in San Leandro, December 23, 1873, is learning the
trade of machinist in the Stockton Combined Harvester and Agricultural Works.
Transcribed by: Jeanne Sturgis Taylor.
An Illustrated History of San Joaquin County, California,
Pages 634-635. Lewis Pub. Co. Chicago,
Illinois 1890.
© 2009 Jeanne Sturgis Taylor.
Golden Nugget Library's San Joaquin County
Biographies
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