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 C. O. R. CARLSON. � A tireless worker, and an unusually aggressive man, fortunate in the possession of foresight, insight, and rare executive ability, is C. O. R. Carlson, a Kingsburg Colony pioneer, who, considering the small beginning, has succeeded to an exceptional degree. He owns two fine ranches, has a beautiful new bungalow residence, with tank-house, barn, water, and all conveniences, and, besides having provided an exquisite piano and other beautiful things for his accomplished daughter, he drives an ele- gant Franklin car. And best of all, whatever Mr. Carlson possesses, he has gained through honest, hard work. He was born at Gotland, a beautiful island of Sweden in the Baltic Sea, and there he grew up till the middle of his sixteenth year, when he left home and shipped as a common sailor. His father was Carl Gustav Carl- son, a farmer of good standing, who was killed in a runaway when sixty- five years of age. His mother, Louisa Regina Verilius before her marriage, came to Kingsburg in 1899 a widow, and here she died, in 1907, seventy- two years old, and beloved by many friends in her native and her adopted countries. The parents had four children, among whom the subject of our sketch was the eldest. Then came Ferdinand who died when he was seven- teen years old ; Maria Carolina, now Mrs. Lindberg, who resides in Kings- burg; and Hjalmar, a farmer on the old homestead at Gotland. . Carl Oscar Reinhold's education was limited, and stopped with his fif- teenth year when he was confirmed in the Lutheran Church. Almost im- mediately thereafter he went to sea, and he followed the sea for years, sail- ing for the most part on Swedish vessels, and visiting among others, these countries and ports: Germany � Kiel, Danzig, Rostock and Luebeck: Brazil � Santos ; Africa � Port Natal ; Australia � Melbourne ; West Indies � Porto Rico ; Mexico � Vera Cruz ; England � Falmouth, Gloucester and Barrow ; Wales � Swansea and Cardiff; the United States � New Orleans and New York. In 1885, Mr. Carlson landed at Galveston, and then and there took "French leave" of his vessel and enlisted in the United States Coast Guard Service and in the Life Saving Service at Galveston. While in this service, he chanced to read of Judge F. D. Rosendahl, who was then promoting the Kingsburg Colony; and entering into correspondence with him, he sent him $250 for Lot 56 in the colony, trusting entirely to the Judge's honor and judg- ment in selecting a good piece of land. This lot comprises the twenty acres upon which Mr. Carlson has so long lived, labored and prospered. Judge Rosendahl gave him a perfectly square deal, and Mr. Carlson has ever since been one of the most aggressive "boosters" of Kingsburg Colony. In addi- tion to his twenty acres here, Mr. Carlson owns an additional forty acres, in full bearing, half a mile north of the Clay School. As a pioneer of the Colony, he was one who helped develop its irrigation. When Mr. Carlson first came here, he camped out under wagons and underwent many inconveniences in order to get started; and now he lives in a beautiful bungalow built in 1015. with all modern conveniences, and looking back along the years to the day of his birth, December 12, 1858, he thanks his stars that fate eventually steered him to California and Fresno County as safe harbors. Mr. and Mrs. Carlson enjoy their home, the more so because of their talented daughter, Florence, who is a student in Heald's Business College at Fresno. Although by birth a foreigner, no one could be more intelligently loyal as an American citizen than Mr. Carlson: and when the war brought its great burden to him with a home appeal, he never shirked, but came up to the line with a subscription for the first Liberty Loan amounting to $500, the total of his subscriptions hems' $2,000 of hard-earned money cheerfully placed at Uncle Sam's disposal. "For," says Carl Carlson, "Uncle Sam has got to have the stuff to win the war."