Los Angeles County CA Archives Biographies.....Jewett, O. W. 1844 - 1908
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Author: Luther A. Ingersoll (1908)

    The late Judge O. W. Jewett, of Sawtelle, was a native of New York, born in
the town of Portland, Chautauqua County, August 7th, 1844.

    His father, Oris Jewett, was a mechanic, and for many years was identified
with extensive machine works at Lowell, Indiana, where the family moved and
located when the son was about six years of age. He there grew up and acquired a
good common school education.

    In 1861, being at the time only seventeen years of age, he volunteered to
defend the cause of the Union and was mustered into the 20th Indiana Infantry
and served three years, the term of his enlistment. He then re-enlisted in the
First Rhode Island Battery and served until the fall of Richmond and the close
of the war, rounding out a continuous service of four years and three months,
chiefly in the Army of the Potomac, during which time he participated in some of
the bloodiest engagements of the sanguinary conflict—notably Fredericksburg,
Spottsylvania Court House, Mire Run, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg and many other
minor engagements.

    After the war he went into the mining regions of Utah and Montana and
followed the occupation of an engineer. By reason of impaired health he
relinquished this business and in 1880 located at Sturgis, then a new town on
the frontier in South Dakota, where he thoroughly identified himself with the
professional and business interest of his adopted city and county. There he held
the office of Justice of the Peace from 1882 until 1890 and became a student of
the law. He was there admitted to the bar of Mead County in 1890 and was almost
immediately elected County Judge, and as a jurist he was held in such high
esteem that he was elected without serious opposition for a second term in 1892.
He thereafter practiced law at Sturgis, having a large clientage.

    In 1903 he came to California and located at Sawtelle where he formed a
partnership with Mr. John Farley and engaged in the real estate business,
meantime practicing his profession. He served as attorney for the Sawtelle
Building & Loan Association. He was also president of the Board of Trustees of
the Sawtelle City School District, in which position he did much for the
advancement of the cause of education and perfection of a sound local school
system, not only devoting his best personal energies, but contributing at times
money to defray expenses that could not otherwise be provided for. He was public
spirited and always ready with his best energies and wise counsel to forward
worthy movements for the public good. He was a man of the more refined social
instincts, a member of the Masonic fraternity, the Odd Fellows, the Knights of
Pythias and the Grand Army of the Republic.

    In politics, Judge Jewett was a consistent Republican, not blindly partisan,
but stood for what he deemed wise party measures and a clean administration of
public affairs.

    Judge Jewett was married at Lowell, Indiana, to Miss Delila Drake. She died
at Sturgis, S. D., in 1887, leaving two children—Fred, now deceased, and Hattie,
wife of Edward Galvin, of Sturgis, S. D. Mr. and Mrs. Galvin have one daughter,
Madge. February 4th, 1889, Judge Jewett married Mrs. Annie, widow of Rev.
Francis C. Haney, Assistant Rector of St. Thomas Episcopal Church, of Montreal,
Canada, by which union there is one son, Oris Francis, born at Sturgis, S. D.,
November 22nd, 1891. Mrs. Jewett is a daughter of James Soutar, a native of
Forfarshire, Scotland, a blacksmith by trade, who came to America in 1853 and
located at Lachute, Quebec, Canada, about forty miles north of Montreal, where
he lived until 1865. He then removed to Black Hills, S. D., where he pursued his
trade and incidentally engaged in mining, passing through the great excitement
of his home state mining days. He also engaged in farming and lived on the first
located land in all that region of country. He finally retired to Sawtelle where
with Mrs. Jewett he spent his declining days. He died April 14th, 1908.

    Mrs. Jewett spent her girlhood and early married life in the City of
Montreal, Canada. Following the death of her first husband she sought the home
and protection of her father at Black Hills. Young and ambitious, she caught the
spirit of enterprise that pervaded the new and prosperous country and acquired
by pre-emption and also by purchase valuable tracts of government land which she
improved and stocked with cattle. These enterprises she so astutely managed as
to make them profitable. Upon coming to California she disposed of her personal
holdings.

    Mrs. Jewett is a lady of social refinement and domestic culture. She is
sweet spirited and vitally interested in local charities. She is an active
member of the Church of Saint Augustine by the Sea, Episcopal, of Santa Monica,
is a member and officer of the Order of the Eastern Star, of Sawtelle.

    Judge Jewett died October 24th, 1907, and was buried under the auspices of
the Masonic fraternity, at Woodlawn Cemetery, Santa Monica.


Additional Comments:
Extracted from:

Ingersoll's century history, Santa Monica Bay cities: prefaced with a brief
history of the state of California, a condensed history of Los Angeles County,
1542 to 1908: supplemented with an encyclopedia of local biography and
embellished with views of historic landmarks and portraits of representative
people.

Los Angeles: Luther A. Ingersoll (1908)


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