Rowell, Albert Abbott

Albert Abbott Rowell, born in Essex County, Vermont, on May 30, 1846, was a prominent pioneer and Union Army veteran who helped shape early Fresno County, California. After his father, Jonathan Rowell, died in Illinois, Albert began working as a farm hand at age fourteen before serving fourteen months in the Civil War with the Seventeenth Illinois Volunteer Infantry. Following a period homesteading and carpentering in Nebraska, he arrived in Fresno County in 1874 to work in sheep-raising with his brothers. He eventually preempted 160 acres near Selma, transforming the land into a highly productive vineyard and orchard estate.

As a skilled carpenter and builder, Rowell contributed directly to the physical infrastructure of the growing region by working on local irrigation systems and cutting timber for Fresno first warehouses and churches. He constructed several notable local structures, including the residence of his brother, Dr. Chester Rowell, and the Rowell Building in Selma, where he retired in 1901. On December 22, 1878, he married Nancy Ann Booth, a pioneer who had crossed the plains by cow team and whose father was a local rancher and millwright. Active in civic life, Rowell was a dedicated Prohibitionist, a leader in the Grand Army of the Republic Post No. 193, and an influential trustee and Sunday School superintendent for the local Christian Church.