Byron Jackson, the youngest of a family of eight, was born in Norwalk, OH in 1841. At the age of 19, Byron and his family emigrated to the Sacramento Valley portion of California.

      Byron opened a shop in the Woodland in 1872. The business was moved to San Francisco, CA in 1879 at 625 West Sixth Street. Shortly after, a sales office was opened on Market Street.

      The company started to build centrifugal pumps in the 1880's. A large demand for them for irrigation occurred in the fruit-growing district of Santa Clara Valley near the city of San Jose, CA.

      Byron Jackson's agricultural machinery manufactory for its chief specialty makes the Jackson Self-Feeder, invented by its proprietor, which is a great saver of time and expense in harvesting grain. By this process the grain is allowed to ripen thoroughly, and as fast as it is cut it is delivered to the self-feeder and elevator. It only remains now to haul the traveling thresher under the spout of the header, and make the mechanical combination, which has been done in the harvester now in use.

      The factory above named is one of the largest on the Pacific coast, covering a large area on Sixth and Bluxome streets. It manufactures steam engines, pumping machinery, road locomotives, or traction engines, specially designed for ploughing, harvesting and freighting, and improved combined harvesters, as well as numerous other machines and implements used by the California farmer. These machines and improvements made by the factory are special patterns of Jackson's iron invention, or embody important improvements made by him, among them one which obviates defects in the traction engines now in use. The factory embraces likewise foundry and machine, wood-working and paint shops, all complete in every department. It gives employment to a large number of skilled mechanics, and its annual output amounts to many thousand dollars in value. The products are distributed over California and into contiguous States and Territories.

Information Sources:

• Norbeck, Jack, Encyclopedia of American Steam Traction Engines, Crestline Publishing Inc, Glen Ellyn, Illinois, pg. 90.
• Steam Power on the American Farm by Reynold M. Wik, 1953 page 255
• The Bay of San Francisco: The Metropolis of the Pacific Coast, V1,1892, pgs. 312-313