Bio: Kildahl, John (1914)

Contact: Crystal Wendt

----Surnames: Kildahl, Nelson 

----Source: History of Eau Claire County, Wisconsin (1914) page 758. 

John Kildahl, the popular and well-known insurance man of Eau Claire, was born in Norway, April 5, 1845, and there grew to manhood, attending the schools of his home county. He followed the occupation of bookkeeper until 1868, when he came to America. He is a man of intellectual attainments and speaks several languages. Owing, however, to a lack of knowledge of the English language when he first came to this country, he was obliged to do manual labor, and his first employment after his arrival in Eau Claire in the fall of 1868 was at lumbering. For a time he was employed in the woods at a salary of $20 per month, and by his energy, thrift and economical habits he managed to save from his salary $300. His desire to obtain a  better knowledge of the English language prompted him to accept work on a farm with an English family, with whom he remained one year. His next move was to McGregor, Ia. Remaining there for a short time, he went South, and after some months of travel over the Southern states he returned to Iowa and was employed in a saw mill for four years, during which time he married Miss Mary Nelson, of Decorah, Ia., and the same year returned to Eau Claire. In 1880 he moved to Menomonie, Wis., and there conducted a foundry for Knapp, Stout & Co. until 1889, when he again returned to Eau Claire and for the next three years was employed as a moulder by the Phoenix Manufacturing Company. 

In 1892 he opened a meat market, which he conducted until 1897, when he engaged in the real estate business, and this has since been his chief occupation. In 1874 at Decorah, Ia., he married Miss Mary Nelson, and to them have been born the following children, viz: Arthur D., Juliet, Emma, Waldemar, John F., Josephine, Conrad and Victor. Mr. Kildahl has always been a loyal, public-spirited man, and holds membership in the Scandinavian Workman's Association, of which organization he was grand master for two years. He is also a member of the Norwegian Synod and is a high-minded man of affairs.