San
Joaquin County
Biographies
OTTO PETERSON
The opportunities afforded in the
West to men of determination and energy are exemplified in the business career
of Otto Peterson, one of the leading citizens of the prosperous town of
Escalon, whose progress is the result of wise investments and industrious
application since he came to this locality some nineteen years ago. He was born near Karlstad, Sweden, January
30, 1871, a son of Peter and Marie (Olson) Nelson, the former born in 1819 and
the latter in 1828, both natives of Sweden.
There were eight children in the family, of whom Otto is the
youngest. He attended the public schools
in his native country and at the age of fourteen years was confirmed in the
Lutheran Church, continuing in that faith to the present day. When Mr. Peterson started out for himself, he
served an apprenticeship for four years and learned thoroughly the carpenter’s
trade. In 1892 at twenty-one years of
age, he left home for America, arriving in New York on April 9, of that year. He did not linger long in the metropolis but
removed to Lakeside, Michigan, where he found employment on the Manistee &
Northeastern Railroad as a carpenter and after three years was made foreman in
the shops, remaining with this company for eleven years, when he came to the
West, where he stopped first at Los Angeles, then went to Stockton, and from
Stockton to Escalon, then a railroad station with one store, two saloons, and a
schoolhouse. He invested in a
twenty-acre tract of land, a portion of the Jones estate, where the family made
their home.
While residing in Michigan, Mr.
Peterson was married in 1893 to Miss Anna Larson, a native of Sweden, who had
come to Michigan with a party of friends.
Mr. and Mrs. Peterson are the parents of seven children: Albert was appointed postmaster of Escalon August
15, 1919 by President Wilson, and efficiently filled the position until he
resigned the office in July, 1922, to enter the grocery business. On September
1, 1917, he was married to Miss Anna C. Vilen and
they have a daughter, Evelyn, and a son, Albert. Carl, who served in the World War in the A.
E. F. in France is in the oil business at Parlier; Hedwig, Mrs. William
Brennan, of Escalon, has three children: William, Richard and Dorothy; Hazel,
Theodore, Isabel and Renold are all at home with our
subject at Escalon. In 1912 Mr. Peterson
became the secretary of the Swedish Colonization Society at Escalon and filled
the position with much credit until the disbandment of the organization. He has been a strong advocate and co-worker
in the cause of irrigation and better school facilities, and as a member of the
Escalon high school board spent considerable time in the interests of the
Escalon Union high school, which completed an $85,000 building in March,
1922. He is a member of the Escalon
Commercial Club and in 1917 gave much time to the South San Joaquin County Fair
Association and was also instrumental in the organization of the First State
Bank of Escalon in 1910, of which he is a trustee. Mr. Peterson has completed his second
residence in the Kern addition to Escalon, having sold the first to the
Standard Oil Company; he also owns two ranches adjacent to Escalon, besides
valuable property within the town limits.
In 1920 he became the junior partner in the firm of Carlson &
Peterson, engaged in real estate and insurance business and the partnership has
been productive of much good to both and in service to the general public. For some years he served as deacon in the
Lutheran Church at Escalon and has always contributed liberally to public and
private charities.
Transcribed by V. Gerald Iaquinta.
Source: Tinkham, George
H., History of San Joaquin County, California , Page
1491. Los Angeles, Calif.: Historic
Record Co., 1923.
© 2012 V. Gerald Iaquinta.
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