Napa County Biographies
Colonel J.P. Jackson
Colonel J.P. Jackson -
Colonel Jackson, whose portrait appears in the body of this work, is an Ohioan.
The first fourteen years of his life were passed in the beautiful city of Cleveland,
and the next twenty-one years in Cincinnati, where he practiced law for fifteen years.
In his profession he was successful, and achieved high honors. This, too, at a b
ar that numbered among its practitioners whom he daily met in regular forensic
rivalry the historic names of R B. Hayes, George E. Pugh, George H. Pendleton,
Alphonso Taft, Milton Sayler, Stanley Matthews and Edward F. Noyes. In 1862, he
served with the Army of the Cumberland, under Rosecrans and Buell; and from
Pittsburg Landing to Corinth, a detached service, under Grant. He went to Europe in
1867 to negotiate the bonds of the California Pacific Railroad Company, and this
service resulted in his moving to the Golden State, where he aided in building the
road named, and remained its President until it was bought by the Central Pacific
Company. He then personally built the Stockton and Copperopolis Railroad and the
Stockton and Visalia branch, until it, in like manner, became by sale the property
of the Central Finding no further territory in the State that would justify in venture,
he then turned his attention from railroading to other channels of business. From his
earliest boyhood he has been prominent as a public speaker. At the age of nineteen he
represented the young men of Cincinnati in the presentation of a purse of money which
he accompanied by a most happy original speech. As an elector for Lincoln and Johnson,
he stumped the States of Kentucky, Southern Ohio and Indiana, and afterwards did the
same service for Grant and Colfax, speaking often in company with Grant's father,
Schuyler Colfax and John Sherman. His speeches in California in the Republican cause
confirmed his Eastern reputation as an eloquent orator, and one of his efforts in a
late canvass was made a campaign document by the State Central Committee. A specimen
of his style is afforded by his speech on the occasion of a banquet to John Russell
Young, given by the journalists of San Francisco, at which was present Generals Grant,
McDowell, Kautz and others of the military, and representatives in full of the local press.
It will pass as a model of post-prandial felicity in speech. Notwithstanding his great
interest in politics, Colonel Jackson has always eschewed official life. He has found his
chosen sphere of happiness in active business, home life and with his books. He has six sons,
two of whom are nearly ready to graduate from college, one at Amherst, Massachusetts, and the
other in Harvard University. In 1864 Colonel Jackson received the unanimous nomination of the
Republican party for Governor of Kentucky, and afterwards declined to go as Congressman from
the Sixth District of that State, when his nomination was equivalent to an election. Near
the close of Andrew Johnson's term his friends pressed upon him the
Commissionership of Internal Revenue, but he refused the appointment and subsequently declined the position
of First Assistant Secretary of the Treasury under Grant. Turning his attention to journalism, he found
the Daily Evening Post not much larger than a good-sized sheet of paper; but, taking charge of it, in less
than five years he has twice enlarged its size, changed its politics from Democratic to Republican, and made
it a recognized power in the journalistic field. As an authority upon and defender of mining interests it
exercises an influence unequalled by any other Pacific Coast journal The career of the Post under Colonel
Jackson's charge is the most conspicuous journalistic success in San Francisco. To meet the increased
demands of its patrons a new press has been made by the Bullock Lightning Press Company, Philadelphia.
While managing the entire business of the paper and many other varied interests as well, he writes very
largely the editorial column and wields a ready and able pen. Ideality and causality are both leading
qualities of his temperament, and hence a poetic imagination is happily supplemented by logical reason.
This makes his writing both engaging and convincing. In 1872 he became the proprietor of the Napa Soda
Springs, and is now giving great attention to the improvement of that property, expending large sums of
money annually for that purpose. In 1857, in Cincinnati, Ohio, Colonel Jackson was united in marriage with
Miss Anna Hooper, a native of Kentucky. They have nine children, seven sons and two daughters, five of
whom were born in Kentucky and the remaining four in California.
History of Napa and Lake Counties,: San Francisco, Cal.: Slocum, Bowen & Co., Publishers, 1881
Transcribed by Julie Appletoft, June, 2007 Pages 493-494
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Last updated June 2007