John Gardner Cortelyou was born on 13. Jan. 1849 at Harlingen, Somerset County, New Jersey. He was the son of
James Garretson Cortelyou and
Cornelia Polhemus. John Gardner Cortelyou married
Mary Van Zandt, daughter of
James Van Zandt and
Catherine 242 Nevius, on 20. Oct. 1869 at Blawenburg, Somerset County, New Jersey. John Gardner Cortelyou died on 8. Jul. 1901 at Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, California, at age 52. He was buried at Hollywood Cemetery, Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, California.
John Gardner began life on a farm not far from Princeton, N. J. In due time he became a student at Rutgers College, New Brunswick, where he joined Delta Upsilon, a social fraternity. But before graduation time would have arrived he married and settled down as a farmer at Harlingen. At one time he was Clerk of the Board of Freeholders of Somerset County. He was one of the first farmers in this section to
buy the new contraption, the self-binder.
In 1884, he removed to Ewing, Nebraska, where he engaged in the banking business, the firm name being "Cortelyou, Ege and Van Zandt."
On March 21, 1887, he sold his 121.57 acre farm at Harlingen, "be-ginning at a stone in the middle of the road leading from the Harlingen road to the mountain, also being corner of James W. Gulick, running thence along Gulick's line south", etc. Consideration was $6,224.38 or $51.20 an acre. Signed : J. Gardner Cortelyou. In later years he regularly signed his name "John G. Cortelyou."
In the early fall of 1890 he sold his interests in Ewing and removed to Omaha. Here he became cashier of the Dime Sayings Bank. The general depression and the collapse of the Omaha boom swept away this bank and some others in the city. Mr. Cortelyou now entered the real estate and inyestment field. When the inventor of a rotary duplicator brought his crude model from Stella, Nebraska, to Omaha, John
Cor telyou, who had, along with business sense, an aptitude in mechanical lines, bought a half-interest in the invention. He helped to develop the machine and to bring it to the commanding position it now occupies in its field.He was also a prime mover in the group which established the Methodist Hospital of Omaha, one of the largest and best hospitals of that city.
John Gardner Cortelyou and his wife were members of the Reformed Dutch Church at Harlingen, N. J., he having joined by confession in January, 1865, and his wife by letter in 1870. He was a deacon in this church from 1873 to 1875 and clerk during the same years. On December 15, 1885, he and his wife were dismissed to the Methodist Church at Ewing, Nebr., the only church in that frontier village at the time.
After removal to Omaha in 1890, he became treasurer of the First Methodist Church of that city. It was through his efforts, largely, that their fine building, which had just been completed but was not entirely paid for, was saved to the congregation in those days of financial distress.
John G. Cortelyou died in Los Angeles, California, while on a visit there. He, his wife, and their sons Willis and Raymond are buried in Hollywood Cemetery, at Los Angeles.