Caleb H. Johnson
Caleb H. Johnson, farmer and stock raiser, Seldon, is the son of William Johnson, who was one of the pioneers of this county, whose biography more fully appears elsewhere in this book. Mr. Johnson is the brother of Thomas G. and Isaac M. Johnson, whose biographies also appear in this work. He was born in Green Township, March 29, 1829, and consequently is in the fifty-third year of his age. He married Nancy Row, daughter of Andrew and Hester Row, November 16, 1850. Her parents are now dead. They lived two years on a farm after their marriage, when they resolved on a trip to California. In November, 1852, they started on their journey. At the end of thirty days they reached the great Sacramento Valley, where they remained for six years, engaged principally in farming, raising as high as a hundred bushels of barley to the acre; of wheat, sixty bushels per acre. The great valley was but sparsely settled at this early day, mining being the absorbing interest of the country. For months their nearest neighbor was four miles away. All nationalities and classes of people roving over the mountains and valleys, making life and property unsafe; but most heroicly did Mrs. Johnson bear up amid all of these discouragements. She was the first woman who went from this county to California, and so far as known was the first woman who crossed the isthmus on a mule. Their career in California was an eventful one, filled with incidents, many of which are quite thrilling.
After their return to Ohio, they settled on a farm which he purchased from Thomas Mattucks, two miles west of the village of Staunton, on the road leading from Staunton to Sabina and Greenfield pike. They remained on this for twenty-one years, when they sold out and purchased what is known as the Milton Severs farm, containing one hundred and thirty acres, in Concord Township, one-half a mile south of the village of Jasper, on the waters of Sugar Creek. They moved to this farm in March, 1880, where they now reside.
Mr. and Mrs. Johnson were without children until after their return from California. They now have two, one son and a daughter. John Row the son, is a sprightly boy fifteen years old. Jenny Riggs is a lovely, bright girl, several years younger than her brother.
Mr. and Mrs. Johnson are genial and kind, having seen much of life in California and elsewhere.
From R. S. Dills' History of Fayette County