San Diego County Biographies
 
JOHN WESLEY WESCOTT

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

 
John Wesley Wescott.--One of the oldest carriage manufacturing establishments in 
San Diego is now conducted by Wescott & Thompson, Mr. Wescott being senior 
partner. He was born in Knox, Waldo County, Maine, July 16, 1838, the third of 
six sons, four of whom are now living. He learned the trade of wagon-making in 
his native town. In 1858 he left home for California, by the Isthmus of Panama. 
The steamer from Panama to San Francisco was the John L. Stephens, with a 
passenger list of 2,250 people, but they arrived safely, with no serious 
accident, October 18, 1858. He then went to Calaveras County, and later to 
Placer County, where he followed the lumber business about two years; then 
returning to Calaveras County, in 1862, he opened a carriage shop and continued 
it until 1869, when he sold out and came to San Diego, opening carriage and 
blacksmith shops in 1871, at the corner of K and Eighth streets, called "Old Big 
Shoe Shop," and continuing until 1877. Then he sold out and went to Arizona and 
conducted a carriage shop at Yuma for about two years, then returned to San 
Diego, and in 1880 opened business at the corner of Eighth and I streets. In 
1882 he moved to the present location on Sixth street, between H and F, with an 
establishment fronting 100 feet on Sixth street and fifty feet on Seventh 
street. Here he carries on a general business,--carriage building, painting, 
repairing, horse-shoeing and all grades of iron work, with a large line of wagon 
supplies. Is also agent for several Eastern wagons and carriages [sic]. He is a 
member of the Royal Arch Masons, and also a member of the Blue Lodge, No. 35; 
also of L. O. O. F., No. 153; Centennial Encampment, No. 58, and of the Canton.

Mr. Wescott was married in Calaveras County in January, 1863, to Miss Martha 
Jane Gillam, a native of Arkansas, whose parents were natives of Indiana. This 
union has been blessed by five children, three of whom only survive: Frank A., 
the oldest; Minnie May, now married and living in Texas, and Maud, the youngest 
and pet of the household.

An Illustrated History of Southern California: Embracing the Counties of San 
Diego, San Bernardino, Los Angeles and Orange, and the Peninsula of Lower 
California, from the Earliest Period of Occupancy to the Present Time.... - 
Chicago: The Lewis Publishing Company, 1890. pp 358