Sonoma-Sutter-Yuba County CA Archives Biographies.....Ferguson, John Nelson 1835 - 
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Joy Fisher sdgenweb@yahoo.com February 28, 2006, 12:29 pm

Author: Alley, Bowen & Co. (1880)

Ferguson, John Nelson, Was born in Clay county, Indiana, September 3, 1835. He
resided in this, Owen and Green counties until about nine years of age; he then,
with his parents (in 1844), moved to Jasper county, Iowa, this county then being
unorganized, it being on the extreme frontier of the new State; his father,
William Washington, having the honor of naming both county and county seat,
calling them after two heroes of the Revolutionary war, Jasper, the county, and
Newton, the county town. In 1849 they crossed the plains to California, with
ox-teams. After a tedious trip of nine months, (losing one yoke of their cattle
by Indians, and the subject of this sketch narrowly escaping the loss of his
life, by the falling of a tree at the hour of midnight on 28th November, across
their tent, in which four of his sisters and brothers and himself were sleeping,
the top of the tree falling on another tent, killing four men, the Alford
family, from Missouri, they finally, about the middle of December, landed, by
the famous "Lamsen route," in the fair land of gold. They spent the remainder of
the Winter in the vicinity of what was known to early comers as Lawson's Ranch,
and in the Spring of 1850 they settled at Yuba City, Sutter county, where they
remained one year; they then spent a few months in Marysville, after which they
opened a boarding-house in Brown's valley, Yuba county, where they remained,
connecting quartz mining with their business, until the fall of 1852, when they
repaired to Keystone Ranch, where they conducted a saw-mill, until the Fall of
1853, when they returned to Brown's valley, (still holding their quartz mining
interests), where they followed mining and the boarding-house business until the
Summer of 1855, when a new mining locality was discovered in the north-western
part of Yuba county, known as Ohio and New York Flats; to the first named place
they removed in the Summer of 1855, where they again engaged in mining and
boarding-house business, until the Summer of 1857, when they came to this county
and settled on the place that John Nelson now owns, located in Alexander valley
(his father having taken up his abode in Healdsburg). He married, August 2,
1864, Miss Elizabeth Mood. By this union they had three children, Erwin,
Clarence and William; the latter died October 12, 1869, at the age of one year,
one month and twenty days. Mrs. Ferguson died October 19, 1869. He again
married, July 24, 1870, Mrs. Sarah J. Bassford, she then having two children,
Ida and Claudius. By the latter marriage they have four children, Mary, Mattie,
Alimeda, and Albert. His occupation is farming and stock-raising.

Additional Comments:
Mendocino Township

Extracted from:

HISTORY
—OF-
SONOMA COUNTY,
-INCLUDING ITS—
Geology, Topooraphy, Mountains, Valleys and Streams;
—TOGETHER WITH—
A Full and Particular Record of the Spanish Grants; Its Early History and
Settlement, Compiled from the Most Authentic Sources; the Names of Original
Spanish and American Pioneers; a full Political History, Comprising the Tabular
Statements of Elections and Office-holders since the Formation of the County;
Separate Histories of each Township, Showing the Advancement of Grape and Grain
 Growing Interests, and Pisciculture;
ALSO, INCIDENTS OF PIONEER LIFE; THE RAISING OF THE BEAR FLAG; AND BIOGRAPHICAL
SKETCHES OF EARLY AND PROMINENT SETTLERS AND REPRESENTATIVE MEN;
—AND OF ITS—
Cities, Towns, Churches, Schools, Secret Societies, Etc., Etc.
ILLUSTRATED.
SAN FRANCISCO:
ALLEY, BOWEN & CO., PUBLISHERS.
1880.


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