Fresno County, California Biographies

Source: History of Fresno County, California, with biographical sketches of 
the leading men and women of the county who have been identified with 
its growth and development from the early days to the present (1919)

History By Paul E. Vandor 
Illustrated, Complete In Two Volumes 
Historic Record Company, Los Angeles, California, 1919
 
Notes: Missing+page1185-1186

Transcribed by Peggy Hooper

This file is part of the California Genealogy & History Archives 
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cagha/index.htm


MRS. ANNA M. ANDERSEN. � A lady of motherly qualities and stead- 
fast Christian character, in which she worthily represents her deceased hus- 
band, the late Niels Andersen, the pioneer among the Danes in this locality, 
is Mrs. Anna M. Andersen, like her husband an expert in farming and fruit- 
raising, and a good organizer and financier, as has been agreeably demon- 
strated since she took charge of the family estate. She is managing the farm 
by the help of her sons, all excellent young men, and they have built the beauti- 
ful bungalow house in which she now makes her home. Her ranch is about 
midway between Selma and Parlier, and it is frequently visited by ranch 
fanciers who enjoy seeing a modest "show-place." 

Mrs. Andersen was born in Denmark, the daughter of Soren Sorensen, 
who married Christini Pedersen, and both of whom were born, married and 
died in Denmark. She was the fifth of six children, and three of her brothers 
preceded her to America. Soren P. Sorensen owns a forty-acre ranch three 
and a half miles from Selma ; Niels P. Sorensen is half a mile to the north of 
her land ; and Chris Sorensen, the rancher, is about a mile away in the same 
direction. Mrs. Andersen came to America in 1897, and took her course west- 
ward by way of Canada, in which country she stayed for a while. In 1899 she 
reached the land of promise of which she had heard so much, and at once 
built her camp-fire at Selma. The following year she met Mr. Andersen, and 
after a brief courtship they were married. 

He was born in Denmark on September 23, 1860, the brother of Jes 
Andersen whose biography is sketched elsewhere in this work; he learned 
the carpenter's trade in Denmark, and in 1880, when only twenty years of age, 
left Denmark and came out to the middle west of the United States. He 
worked as a carpenter, and at building and grading a railway in Wyoming, 
and little by little he made enough progress to enable him to remove further 
west. When he reached California, he worked in the timber woods at Pine 
Ridge, Fresno County; and continuing to save his money, he was able to 
make his first investment in a California ranch. At the same time that his 
brother bought twenty acres, he also purchased twenty adjoining, both tracts 
being wheat field. The purchase was made of W. J. Berry, the pioneer of 
Selma, and has proven an excellent buy. Mr. Andersen had worked for three 
years at the famous Boston Ranch at Fresno, and there had acquired valuable 
knowledge and experience that stood by him when he came to develop his 
new possession. 

Later he bought forty-eight acres more, and. as soon as he could, he 
planted all his land and otherwise improved it. He had always been a very 
conscientious, careful worker, striving for the highest results and least of 
all favoring himself, and through overwork and exposure he was taken with 
pneumonia, which developed into Bright's Disease, and he died on October 
26, 1915, aged fifty-five years. He was mourned by a devoted widow, by a 
whole community, and quite as much by his three children, Hans, Christian, 
and Edith. 

Business-like in managing his private affairs, a man who believed in 
setting his house in order and in assisting others to do likewise, Mr. Andersen 
helped to organize the First National Bank of Parlier and was on the bank's 
first board of directors. Men of far larger affairs reposed their faith in his 
integrity, no less than in his judgment, and were never misguided.