Sutter-Yuba County Biographies


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



JAMES M. NANCE
 
            Posterity, especially in California, will not soon let pass from 
memory the lives and good works of such worthy pioneers as Mr. and Mrs. James 
Nance, long prominent citizens of Marysville.  Mr. Nance was born in Illinois.  
His parents, Jefferson and Sarah (Step) Nance, came from Tennessee and Kentucky, 
from which region they migrated in 1833.  He attended the best of schools 
available in Illinois, and when twenty-two years of age came out to California.  
Here he entered upon his career as a buyer and seller of cattle, which he 
successfully followed all the rest of his life.  He had taken up the industry 
with his father, and thus was well prepared for the work through previous 
experience.  He was noted for his progressive ideas, his ambition to excel and 
his willingness to help others to attain, and his faith in California.  An 
earnest Methodist, he was always ready to participate in good works, civic, 
religious and sociological, and was known all over Northern California for his 
charity.  He died in July, 1898, aged sixty-five years, nine months and twenty 
days, and at his passing he was widely mourned.
            At Marysville, in the year 1872, Mr. Nance was married to Miss 
Catherine Fitzpatrick, a native of New York City, a daughter of Philip and 
Bridget Fitzpatrick, natives of County Cavan, Ireland, where they were reared 
and educated.  They had emigrated to New York City separately; and there they 
were married, the ceremony being performed by the Rt. Rev. Bishop Quarters.  The 
father was foreman for Ashford and Company, coal merchants.  In 1868 he brought 
his wife and children to California, arriving in San Francisco on May 18, of 
that year, and joined his daughter Catherine, who had come to Marysville in 
1861.  In this county the father passed away, while his widow spent her last 
days in Sacramento.  They were a fine old couple, well-known for their integrity 
and honesty of purpose.  Of their ten children, Catherine was the fifth in order 
of birth.  She was reared in New York City and attended the public school at 
Sheriff and Stanton Streets, as well as the Sisters of Mercy Academy.  She came 
out to California via Panama in 1861, at the age of sixteen, and has always been 
highly esteemed for her own elevated character and for her spirit of helpfulness 
towards others.  A son, William, died at the age of five.  Charles lived to be 
thirty-five years of age; George died at thirty-one; Clara died on July 19, 
1917.  A daughter, Mary, has become Mrs. Charles Lutz, and lives in Chico.  
Edwin, Joseph and Catherine Brow are the three grandchildren.  Mrs. Nance bought 
the house where she now lives in 1877.  She has long been prominent in the city 
and county in which she lives.
 
History of Yuba and Sutter Counties, Historic Record Company, Los Angeles, 1924
p. 1162