Nord, E. M.

E. M. Nord was born in Sweden on September 19, 1884, to parents J. P. Nord and Susanna Charlotte Timan. In 1888, he immigrated to America with his mother and brothers to join his father, who had settled in Fresno, California. The family permanently located in the Kingsburg Colony in 1889, where Edward grew up, attended the Harrison district school, and later completed a business course at Heald and Jones Business College in Stockton.

Beginning his farming career at twenty years of age, Edward became a prominent viticulturist, developing a superior twenty-acre Muscat vineyard in the San Joaquin Valley and constructing the first fruit dryer in the Kingsburg Colony in 1916. He operated sixty acres in total, served as a key organizer and solicitor for the California Associated Raisin Company, and held leadership roles in the local Farmers Union and California Peach and Prune Growers Associations. Married in 1912 to Miss Sophia Bengston of Kingsburg, with whom he had two children named Howard R. and Adeline C., he remained an influential Republican, active civic worker, and highly successful agricultural pioneer until his later years.