Contra Costa County Biography

GEORGE W. KNIGHT

Transcribed by Sally Kaleta, December, 2006.

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

 
No one man has done more to advance the agricultural, horticultural, and 
commercial interests of eastern Contra Costa County than George W. Knight, of 
Knightsen. Enterprising, energetic, and progressive, he has developed one of the 
best paying ranches in that section. Mr. Knight was born in Chelsea, Maine, 
January 20, 1843, and is a son of John and Adeline (Tibbetts) Knight. At the age 
of twenty-three he became dependent upon his own resources, and went to 
Massachusetts, where he followed the occupation of landscape gardening. He saved 
considerable money, and in 1874 he determined to cast his lot with the Golden  
West and sailed for California via the Panama route. He went to Santa Barbara, 
where he found employment on a ranch. His desire was to own a fine ranch. 
Through the result of close economy, after working out in San Francisco, Marin 
County, Livermore Valley, and Antioch, he obtained a sufficient sum to enable 
him to rent a ranch in connection with G. Dunbar and N. B. Hewitt. Later Mr. 
Knight engaged in the hay-pressing business. He followed this and other work 
until 1883, when he purchased one hundred and ten acres, a part of the Barkley 
ranch, and began to improve it. He devoted the land to the cultivation of grain 
and hay, and met with financial success. He then purchased eighty acres, and 
again ten acres adjoining. Mr. Knight set out several acres of almonds. He 
raised all of his own trees and did considerable nursery work. He propagated the 
"Klondike" almond, and made exhibits at the St. Louis Exposition in 1904. 
Foreseeing the need of a shipping station and post-office at that point on the 
Santa Fe Railroad, in 1900 he had surveyed seven and a half acres of land, 
erected a store and post-office, and on May 15 was appointed postmaster. Mr. 
Knight was united in marriage on March 2, 1885, to Christina Christensen, a 
native of Denmark, the daughter of Johan and Anna (Hansen) Christensen, and it 
was the combination of the two names which gave the name to the town of 
Knightsen. To this union have been born Amy Marie, wife of Harvey Nelson Rook, 
of Williamsport, Pa., married September 5, 1902, and engaged in the grocery 
business in Los Angeles. They have four children - Virginia Margaret Amy, born 
January 31, 1904; Harvey Nelson, born January 23, 1906; Robert McClellan, born 
January 14, 1909; and Ellen Marie, born October 1, 1912. Addie Flora Knight was 
married to Phillip Cohen Mecum, of Chico, California, July 17, 1911. Their one 
child, Vernon Claire, was born July 27, 1914. Essie Wilmena Knight was united in 
marriage to Lewis Ervin Lehmer, of Harrisburg, Pa., June 2, 1912. Their one son, 
Lewis Erwin Jr., was born April 24, 1913. Mr. Lehmer is connected with the 
Southern Pacific Company as station agent at Raisin City, Fresno County, 
California. George W. Knight has been a life-long Republican. He has served on 
the Knightsen school board for a period of fourteen years, and served as clerk 
of the board most of the time. He has never aspired to public office. Mr. Knight 
raised 2065 sacks of barley on sixty-five acres in 1915, and he has twenty-five 
acres set out to almonds, and ships annually on an average about eight tons of 
the finest almonds grown in California.
 
Source: "The History of Contra Costa County, California", Elms Publ. Co., 1917, 
pp. 501-502.