JOHN SORENSONJOHN SORENSON, identified with building operations in El Paso, where, as a contractor, he has been accorded a liberal patronage resulting in the construction of some of the finest and most substantial buildings of the city, is a native of Denmark, born December 17, 1852. He came to the United States in 1868, at the age of sixteen years, settling first in Warren county, Pennsylvania, where he lived until 1872—the year of his arrival in Texas. He had learned the trade of a brick layer and he was employed in the vicinity of Dallas, which was then a small town. In the latter part of 1873 he went to San Antonio and beginning at Harwood worked on the construction of the Galveston, Harrisburg & San Antonio Railroad, which was the only line in Texas on which the work of the financial panic of that year. Mr. Sorenson was thus engaged for about two years, after which he spent a brief period at Austin and later he returned to the railroad work, which claimed his time and energies until the line was extended to San Antonio in 1877. Two years later were there passed, after which Mr. Sorenson started westward, making an overland trip through Texas with teams with a party of about thirty-two, their destination being Leadville, Colorado, at a point where rich mineral deposits had recently been discovered. After meeting with many dangers, hardships and difficulties, the party arrived at Las Vegas, New Mexico, where Mr. Sorenson met Charles Wheelock, an architect, for whom he had formerly done some work in Texas. Upon Mr. Wheelock’s solicitation Mr. Sorenson decided to remain in Las Vegas and work there, while the remainder of the party continued on to Leadville. The Santa Fe Railroad had not yet reached that town but was completed to Las Vegas on the 4th of July of that year, 1879. In those days Las Vegas was a typical western town filled with the excitement incidental to the building of a new railroad, the opening of mines and the rule of a large element of lawless people who wished to make their living by dishonest methods. Mr. Sorenson worked for nearly a year in the vicinity of Las Vegas, after which he became connected with the work of building of the officers’ quarters at Fort Stanton, a task that required about six months. He then met the man who had the contract for building Fort Bliss on the western edge of El Paso. This was in 1880, about a year before the railroad was completed to the city. He remained on the construction work of Fort Bliss until it was completed , and then turned his attention to the contract business in brick and stone. This has claimed his attention continuously since and he has done the work on a large number of El Paso buildings, beginning with the first brick buildings to be erected here in the early days. He has a partner, J. E. Morgan, under the firm style of Sorenson & Morgan. They have a brick yard for the manufacture of brick in the Cotton addition near the river in El Paso, also a brick manufacturing plant at Las Cruces, New Mexico, where they have been and are now putting up some substantial buildings in that governing city. Mr. Sorenson was married to Miss Alice Smith, who came to El Paso with her family from New Orleans. Six children have been born of this marriage. Mr. Sorenson belongs to the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks and to the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and is in sympathy with the teachings and tenets of those societies. Coming to America empty-handed but imbued with a desire to benefit his financial condition in the different business environment of the new world, he has steadily worked his way upward and as opportunity has offered has broadened the scope of his labors until he is today a leading contractor of El Paso with a business which at once indicates his fidelity to the terms of a contract, his efficiency in his work and the confidence reposed in him by those who have employed his services. B. B. Paddock, History and Biographical Record of North and West Texas (Chicago: Lewis Publishing Co., 1906), Vol. I, p. 467-468. |
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