BIO: Andrew J. PETERSON, Clearfield County, PA
 
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From Twentieth Century History of Clearfield County, Pennsylvania,
and Representative Citizens, by Roland D. Swoope, Jr.,
Chicago: Richmond-Arnold Publishing Company, 1911, pages 828 & 829.
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  ANDREW J. PETERSON, a leading citizen of Cooper township, Clearfield county, 
Pa., of which he is supervisor, is engaged in contract work and custom coal 
mining.  He was born January 22, 1869, near the city of Guttenberg, Sweden, a 
son of Lars and Sophia Peterson.
  The parents of Mr. Peterson are natives of Sweden, where the father was born 
in 1833 and the mother in 1837.  The former came to America in 1881 and the 
latter in 1883.  He engaged first in coal mining but for twenty-three years 
owned a farm in Tioga county, Pa., which he sold several years ago.  He still 
resides in Tioga county.  Thirteen children were born to Lars and Sophia 
Peterson, two of whom died in infancy and one at a later age.  The survivors 
are:  Charlotta, who is the wife of Andrew Allen, of Antrim, Tioga county; 
Matilda, who is the wife of Frank Anderson, a farmer of Stony Fork, Tioga 
county; Charles, who is a farmer in Delmont township, Tioga county, and married 
Matilda Frisk; Lars, who resides in Oregon; Andrew J.; Peter, who lives at Stony 
Fork, Tioga county; Otto, who is a contractor, living in the West; Jennie, who 
married Andrew Klang, a miner residing at Antrim, Tioga county; and John and 
Edward, who live in Colorado, where they own 600 acres of farm land.  Gustav, 
who died at the age of thirty-four years, was a resident of Antrim, Tioga 
county.  He married Augusta Neilson and his surviving family live in Clearfield 
county.
  Andrew J. Peterson attended the public schools in his native land and after he 
was occupied in self-supporting way in the day time, continued his studies in 
the night schools.  When he was eight years old he began to be useful as a 
cattle herder.  In 1882 he came to America and was thirteen years of age when he 
went to work in the mines at Antrim, where he continued until he was eighteen 
and afterward at odd times, again worked at mining.  For some years he was 
engaged in lumbering and during two years of this period followed contract work 
in the woods.  After coming to Clearfield county he was with the Sommerville 
Coal Company, for thirteen months as weighman.  For some years he has been 
mainly engaged in contract work and custom coal mining, is a general contractor 
of bituminous coal, a dealer in fertilizers, and makes a specialty of 
contracting for water line, concrete work, reservoirs, and other similar 
constructive work.  He completed a $5,000 contract for the Winburne water line.  
He is a careful, experienced man in this line of work and the public has 
confidence both in his ability and business integrity.  Mr. Peterson owns 
twenty-two and one-half acres of land at Lanse, on which he has lived for 
thirteen years.  When he purchased it it was wild and entirely unimproved.  At 
that time he was engaged in mine work and frequently after the labor of a hard 
day was completed, he worked until ten o'clock at night clearing the land.  He 
had to clear a space on which to build his house, which he erected in 1899 and 
later put up his substantial barn.  Mr. Peterson has here a valuable property 
and a comfortable home and there is every reason for him being proud of it as it 
is practically all the work of his own hands.
  On September 22, 1893, Mr. Peterson was married to Miss Christiana Erickson, a 
daughter of Erick Larson.  According to old Swedish law and custom, the given 
name and surname are reversed in succeeding generations, thus Erick Larson, in 
following generations becomes Lars Erickson.  The same custom prevails in Wales.  
Eight children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Peterson, namely:  Annie Cecelia, 
Eric Adolph, Charlotta, Carl Herbert, Hedwig Sophia, Henry Theodore, Agnes and 
Evaline Elizabeth.  Mr. and Mrs. Peterson are members of the Evangelical 
Lutheran church at Lanse.  He belongs to the fraternal order known as the 
Scandanavian Brotherhood.  In politics he is a Republican and has served two 
years as school director, one year as auditor of Cooper township, and at present 
is serving in his second year of a four-year term as township supervisor.