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James Lewis Wilson, known as “Lew” (or sometimes “Lou”) was the ninth and youngest child of James Harvey and Susanna Martha (Martin) Wilson. He was born on 31 May 1886 in Prairie Township, Fremont County, Iowa, about 6 miles east of Sydney. Census records show him in Prairie Township, in his parents’ home, in 1895 and 1900. Lew was just 14 when his father died and 16 when he moved to Paonia, Delta County, Colorado, along with his mother and his older brother Charles. There he grew to maturity and married (1) Catharine Lourilla Anderson (known as Lourilla) on 10 April 1907. Lourilla had been born 15 October 1886 at Wilsonville, Furnas County, Nebraska, the daughter of William H. and Lydia Jane (McFarland) Anderson. What became of her father after Lourilla was born is unknown. Six years later (1892), her mother married Almond Winn in Sherman County, Kansas. In 1905, Lourilla, with her mother and stepfather, moved to Paonia, where she met and married Lew. The same week he was married, Lew bought an established ice business in Paonia, with a pond, two ice houses, and an attached residence, which is where he and Lourilla set up housekeeping together. When not hauling ice, Lew sometimes hauled stone from a local quarry, which is how he came to be injured one day in June 1908. According to The Newspaper of Paonia (19 June 1908, p. 10), Lew’s wagon overturned on him as he was hauling a load of stone, resulting in three fractured ribs and a badly lacerated (but not broken) leg. After nearly 2 years in the ice business, Lew sold the facilities in February 1909. It’s not clear how he made his living during the following year, but in April of 1910, he and Lourilla packed up and moved down to Montezuma County, Colorado, more than 100 miles south of Paonia, where his brothers Elza, Isaac, and Charles had already settled. The 1910 census shows “Louis” and “Laurilla” Wilson in Precinct 8 of Montezuma County, with their two sons Harry and Loyd. Lew and Lourilla either moved about in the county or had multiple properties. The precinct identified in the census was about 4 miles north of Cortez, close to Lew’s brothers. According to a Wilson family history, though, Lew and his family moved up to Yellow Jacket about 1911 and then over to Dolores a few months after that. Dolores is where their daughter Jennie was born in August 1912. In 1913 and '14, multiple items in local newspapers referred to Lew as “J. L. Wilson of Lewis, Colorado.” In January 1916, Lew filed a homestead application on 80 acres about three miles south of Dolores (N½NW¼ sec 10 T36N, R15W), which he “proved up” on three years later. Lew listed Dolores as his address on his draft registration filed in September 1918, and he also listed his occupation then as “Theater Manager,” which is consistent with a note in The Dolores Star of 26 July 1918 (p. 1) saying that Lew had taken charge of the Dolores Opera House. His role as a theater manager apparently did not last long. The 1920 census shows “J. L.” and “Laurilla” Wilson in Dolores, and lists J. L.’s occupation as “Janitor at school house.” It also shows them living then with all three of their children, who were:
In February 1923, The Dolores Star reported that Lew and his family were moving to Ridgway, Colorado, where he would take charge of the oil station. I don’t know if the paper got the name of the town wrong or if Lew only stayed briefly in Ridgway, but by July the Star was reporting on some local folks who had had a pleasant visit with Lew and his family up in Placerville, San Juan County, Colorado.
Lew ran into a bit of legal trouble in Placerville, though, as detailed in the clipping shown at right. Unfortunately, I haven’t learned the outcome of this case. In November 1923, The Daily Journal reported that the case “was continued until the next term of the district court,” but I can find no further reports about it. Lew and Lourilla remained in Placerville for several years. The 1930 census shows them there (with Lourilla identified as “Lauretta”), along with their two sons and a daughter-in-law “Clara” (Harry’s wife Emma Clare). Lew’s occupation is listed as Gas & Oil Dealer; Harry was working as a truck driver. I do not know where their daughter Jennie was at the time of this census. Her eventual husband, Earl Hocker, was still single and living with his parents in Delta, Colorado, so Jennie apparently was not yet married. I have very little information about the family from the rest of the 1930s. Harry’s son, Harry Jr., was born in September 1930 in Montrose County, Colorado; Jennie’s son William Hocker was born in Nevada County, California, in February 1933 (so, presumably, she married sometime prior to that); and Lloyd married Viola Knoop in Reno, Nevada, in March 1938. Other than that, I have only the notations from the 1940 census showing where people had been living in 1935: Lloyd in Tuolumne County, California; Jennie in Mesa County, Colorado; and Lew, Lourilla, and Harold were all still in San Miguel County. Big changes came in 1940, though. On 20 January 1940, the Nevada State Journal (Reno, Nevada, p. 8) reported that James Lewis Wilson was granted a divorce from Catherine Lourilla Wilson. The following day (21 Jan. 1940, p. 12) it reported that J. L. Wilson had married (2) Mary A. Stratton of Sonora, California. Both of these events, of course, were in Reno, Nevada. Mrs. Mary Arvilla (Patterson) Stratton had been born 25 December 1889 in Kearney, Nebraska, the daughter of William Wallace Patterson and Pattie Margaret (Giddings) Patterson. She had previously married Harvey G. Stratton on 1 February 1919 at Vancouver, Washington, and he had died on 3 October 1936 in Stanislaus County, California. She had no children from her first marriage. By the time of the 1940 census, in April of that year, Lew and Mary were living in Township #4 of Shasta County, California, both working in an apartment house — Lew as a janitor and Mary as a housekeeper. Harry and Lloyd then were both in Tuolumne County, California, with their wives; Jennie was in Delta, Colorado, with her husband and his whole family; and Lourilla, with a marital status of “Divorced,” was working as a housekeeper in the home of Dr. L. E. Hillman in Fort Morgan, Colorado. Shasta County “Township #4,” where Lew and Mary lived, was in the area then called Central Valley, which was incorporated into the City of Shasta Lake in 1993. Central Valley and various adjoining settlements were established by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation in 1938 to house workers for the construction of Shasta Dam. Soon after settling there, Lew hired on as a janitor for the Reclamation offices in the adjoining community of Toyon (also now part of Shasta Lake). His World War II draft registration card, submitted in 1942, lists “U.S.B.R.” as his employer and Toyon as his place of business. Similarly, the 1950 census shows Lew and Mary still in Central Valley, with Lew working as a janitor for USBR. According to Lew’s obituary, he worked a total of 15 years for Reclamation.1 The 1950 census also shows Mary working as a nurse, which is the same occupation that had been shown for her in the 1930 census, back when she was still married to H. G. Stratton. In addition, we know that Lew’s first wife, Catherine Lourilla Wilson, was also living in California by 1950, even though she is not listed unambiguously in the census.2 Lourilla died on 12 February 1962 at Stockton, San Joaquin County, California, and was buried at Roseville in Placer County, California. Lew and Mary resided in Central Valley for the rest of their lives, but both died at hospitals in Redding, California — Lew on 11 September 1965 and Mary on 1 June 1978. They are buried together at Redding Memorial Park. Obituaries for Lew, Lourilla, and Mary are posted here. If you can suggest any corrections to the information above or provide any further details about the lives of Lew, Lourilla, Mary, and their descendants, please contact me at the address shown in the image below:
Thanks,
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