San
Joaquin County
Biographies
GEORGE NELSON
A man of wide and valuable
experience, and exceptional ability, natural and developed, in his important
line of work, George Nelson, at present foreman for Messrs. Daniels &
Green, Stockton, has been prominent for some years on account of his active and
responsible connection with construction work, having much to do with the
development of both the city and San Joaquin County. He was born on a farm in Sweden on October 8,
1883, the son of Jons Nilsson, a farmer, and his good
wife, Johanna, worthy folk in moderately independent circumstances, and he was
the youngest of five children that grew up.
His parents were devoted to their family, and from his sixth to
fourteenth year, he was sent to the excellent Swedish schools, so famous for “sloyd” and other progressive features, while at the proper
age he was confirmed in the Swedish Lutheran Church. After confirmation, toward his middle-teens,
he left home and struck out into the world to make his own living; and for
awhile he followed various kinds of work, in time learning the trade of a
carpenter, and learning it thoroughly, as is customary in his native land.
In 1903, spurred on by the many
stories of greater opportunity in the New World, he crossed the ocean sailing
from Malmo, Sweden, on July 10, on the “Oscar II” of the Scandinavian-American
Line, landing at Ellis Island after a pleasant ocean voyage of two weeks. He did not tarry long in the metropolis, but
pushed on toward the west, to South Dakota and Rapid City, at which place his brother-in-law
and sister, Mr. and Mrs. N. F. Nelson, were holding down a homestead. He remained there a week,
then found work as a cage tender in the Clover Leaf gold mine at Roubaix, South
Dakota, where his brother, Carl J. Nelson, now a building contractor at French
Camp, was employed. For a year and a
half he worked in their gold mine, sticking to his post as long as the mine was
operated.
Thrown again upon his resources, and
coming fortunately under the spell of the still more wonderful stories about California,
Mr. Nelson in 1905 continued his migration, accompanied by his said brother
Carl J., this time to the Pacific Coast, and arrived at Sacramento in the month
of March of that year. As he did not find
the right kind of work in the Capital City, he went to Camino, in El Dorado
County, where he put in a hard year working for the El Dorado Lumber Company, building
dry-kilns and other structures. He then
secured a job with the Southern Pacific Railroad Company as bridge and
house-builder; but after two years of continuous work in that company’s
service, where he added to his reputation for both skill and dependability, in
1907 he went to work for the Western Pacific Railroad Company, and continued
there for a year and a half as carpenter and builder. He helped to build the roundhouse and other
much-needed structures, and was sent to Stockton, where he assisted in putting
up the Western Pacific roundhouse. From
the first he liked Stockton and resolved some day to settle here.
During 1909, Mr. Nelson returned to
Sweden for a visit to his parents, who are, happily, still living and
prosperous there, leaving here on August 6, and arriving at Malmo, the same
month. Sweden looked good to him again,
despite the attractions of California, and he remained at his old home for some
months. Then, like almost everyone else
who has once partaken of the pleasures of residence and life in the Golden
State, he came back to California, leaving Sweden on January 3, 1910. He first made his way to England, and there
took passage on the great steamer “Lusitania,” now immortal through her tragic
fate in the recent World War; and in time he arrived safely at Stockton again,
greatly benefited, and with an enlarged experience, on account of his wide
tour. For awhile he re-engaged with the
Western Pacific Railroad. It was not
long, however, before an offer from Edgar Woodruff drew him from railroad work
to the new “Record Building,” the future home of the Stockton Daily Record, and
he continued with that leading contractor for a year. He then worked for Tom Lewis, the contractor
and builder, for another year, and in 1913 entered upon a four months’ service
with James Mulcahy, a Stockton contractor and builder
who was just then erecting St. Gertrude’s Church in Stockton; and he next went
to work for Messrs. Daniels & Green, a firm widely known beyond the
confines of San Joaquin County. That was
in the latter part of 1915, and he has remained with them ever since. Mr. Nelson has steadily advanced in the
development of their extensive operations, having been appointed in 1917
foreman of construction, a post he has filled with signal ability ever
since. He has thus come to have charge
of many of the most important buildings erected in Stockton in recent years,
including the brick block at the southwest corner of Main and Aurora streets,
known as the City Development Building, an addition to the Harris Manufacturing
Company’s plant, the basement and vaults for the Commercial Savings Bank
Building, the office of the Kroyer plant on Cherokee
Lane, and the Levy Bros. Department Store Building on Main and Hunter streets,
an edifice of five stories, with a basement, erected at a cost of $250,000,
which will ever stand a monument both the contactors, Messrs. “Daniel &
Green, and their superintendent, George Nelson, attesting remarkable excellence
of workmanship, especially when it is remembered that the old building was torn
down and the new one built in the short space of six months, a record in the
building line of Stockton. Mr. Nelson
also had charge of the remodeling by his firm of the Smith & Lang store
building at the corner of Main and San Joaquin streets, and the Raggio building
and the structure to be occupied by the Ernest Wilson Company on North Sutter
Street, in Stockton.
On April 27, 1912, Mr. Nelson was
married to Miss Caroline Johnson, a native of Sweden but at that time living at
Oakland, an accomplished woman who has made him just the right kind of a
helpmate; and their fortunate union has been blessed with the birth of three
children: Elsie Mona, Clara Elizabeth,
and George Walter. Mr. and Mrs. Nelson
own their comfortable residence at 420 East Arcade Street, Stockton. Mr. Nelson is a member of the Modern Woodmen
of America, and also of the Swedish social and fraternal lodge, the Vasa Orderen, of Stockton; and
those well acquainted with him will agree that there can be no more popular and
welcome member in either of these organizations.
Transcribed by Gerald Iaquinta.
Source: Tinkham, George
H., History of San Joaquin County, California , Pages
896-899. Los Angeles, Calif.: Historic
Record Co., 1923.
© 2011 Gerald Iaquinta.
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