He left the family farm in 1850 at the age of 23 and set out to the California Gold Rush to make his fortune.

[2] This machine was a simple steam engine mounted on a wooden skid which enabled loggers to employ cables to move giant logs across long distances or steep terrain to adjacent railways or waterways.

Examples of working Donkey engines can still be found operating during special occasions at Fort Humboldt State Historic Park in Eureka.

His family endured yet a final tragedy after his death when on July 9, 1904, his daughter Bertha committed suicide at the Waldorf Astoria in New York City, putting the battle for the estate in the California Courts through 1908.

The bulk of his estate went to his lone surviving daughter Bertha, and was worth nearly one million dollars.