JOHN W. NORTH

'John Wesley North' (1815-1890) was a 19th century pioneer American statesman of national reputation. He is the founder of the cities of Northfield, Minnesota, and of Riverside, California, where John W. North High School is named after him.

Contents

Early Life and Career

Founding Northfield, Minnesota

Nevada Judiciary

Founding Riverside, California

References

External links

Early Life and Career

North was born at Sand Lake, Rensselaer County, New York, January 4 1815. [1] He started teaching school at the age of 15 and became a licensed lay preacher in 1833. He completed his postsecondary education at Cazenovia Seminary in New York and attended Wesleyan University. He later studied law and was admitted to the New York State Bar in 1845.
His first wife was Emma Bacon (d. 1847). In 1848, he married Ann Hendrix Loomis.
He moved to the Minnesota Territory in 1849 where he continued to practice law. The first years in Minnesota were spent at St. Anthony. In the fall of 1850, North was elected a member of the second legislature of the territory. He ran for reelection in the 1851 elections but was defeated. He was one of the founders of the Republican Party of Minnesota in 1855. In 1857, he was a member of the Minnesota state Constitutional Convention. In 1860, he was a delegate to the Chicago Republican Convention which nominated Abraham Lincoln for the presidency of the United States and was a member of the committee that went to Springfield to notify Lincoln of his nomination.
In addition to his legislative career in Minnesota, North was influential in founding the University of Minnesota, wrote the act which became the University's charter and was treasurer of its board of regents (an appointed position) from 1851-60.

Founding Northfield, Minnesota

On August 17 1855, North purchased 160 acres (0.6 km²) of land from three farmers: Daniel Kuykendahl, Daniel Turner, and Herman Jenkins. The entire tract of 320 acres (1.3 km²) was platted in the fall of 1855, and the plat of the Original Town, comprising most of what is now the First and Second wards and a small tract across the river south of the section line now marked by Fourth street, was filed in the office of the register of deeds March 7 1856. The town was named Northfield, Minnesota.
In the summer of 1855 North started work on the dam and a $4,000 saw mill which began sawing lumber about the first of December of that year.

North’s wife, Ann Loomis North, and three children aged four months to four years, joined him in Northfield in on January 3