Sen. Niels Christensen, Jr.

Time line for Niels Christensen, Jr. 1876-1939

1876 Niels, Jr., was born to Niels and Abbie Christensen on April 21st.

1896 Joined Niels, Sr. and brother Frederik at N. Christensen & Sons.

1901-04 Elected a member of the Beaufort County Board of Education.

1903 Purchased the Beaufort Gazette and assumed roles of publisher and editor.

1905-25 Elected State Senator from Beaufort. Served for twenty years.

1908 Served on the South Carolina Senate Commission on Education.

1912 Married Katharine Wales (“Nancy”) Stratton on December 3rd at Kings' Chapel, Boston, Massachusetts.

Ca 1912-19 Served on the Senate Finance Committee. Elected Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee. Served as a member of the South Carolina State Budget Commission.

1915 Served on the Senate Printing Investigating Commission.

Ca 1915 Enlisted as an ensign in the Navy based in Charleston.

1916 Served as Chairman of the Joint Committee on Printing.

1920-22 Served as President of the South Carolina Chamber of Commerce.

1921 The offices of the Beaufort Gazette burned. Niels left the newspaper business.

1922 Chairman of the Joint Committee on Printing, General Assembly of South Carolina.

1925 N. Christensen & Sons entered bankruptcy and went out of business.

1931-32 Founder and President of the South Carolina Farmers' and Taxpayers' League

1938 Nancy died on September 28th after a battle with cancer.

1939 On August 19, Niels died as a result of injuries sustained in a car accident.

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Political Views and Family Influence

Niels Christensen, Jr., due to his family influence and actions in the community, would throughout his twenty year career in the South Carolina Senate, be accused of being too racially liberal. One or his opposers in a smear campaign, stated he had seen his sister kiss a black girl after a baptism. Niel's would settle this dispute with a fist fight , in which he was the victor. After being bested his opponent would admit he wasn't sure it was Niel's sister after all. Niel's would state that all these tactics and accusations detracted from the issues and reforms he wanted to be remembered for. In his exposer of public officials that pocketed money from the state-run liquor dispensary, one of the accused officials would try to use the fact that Niel's father had led Negro troops against southerners in the Civil War. He would defend his father's actions, as did several of the veterans of the community. The dispensary was closed in 1907 and the system abolished in 1916, a victory for those that wished to "cleanse the towns of the rowdy Southern male culture of drinking". Senator Cole Blease, who was supported by the state liquor and gambling interests, would become governor of South Carolina in 1910 and would attempt to block any legislation proposed by Niels. Blease would criticize the Shanklin School, of which Niels was a trustee, for promoting social equality.

His mother Abbie's influence can not be denied, and she supported her son and his causes from the wings. One of the issues she and Niels were passionate about was the state of the insane asylums in South Carolina. They had the highest death rate and lowest recovery rate of any state's asylums. After this bill passed, she would write in her diary that she wrote most of the bill for her son, possibly due to her mother's mental illness and subsequent death while committed. It is suspected she ghost-wrote for her son on bills concerning other issues as well, but no record of this exists.

The era following the civil was was volatile in the South, with racial involved murders and lynchings happening in the communities. The NAACP reported between 1900 and 1918, 54 African Americans were lynched in South Carolina. Abbie would join the Association of Southern Women for Prevention of Lynching. Niels and brother Fred would find themself in the hot seat and would personally go to towns to prevent violence, acting as a mediator and preventer of violence.

Abbie tried to stay in the background, but her views became a constant threat to her son's political career. A rival newspaper would print a cartoon depicting Niel's running from a large black women with Family Record printed on her skirt. The caricature stated "Come back here Niel's, you have to stay wid' the family". Niels caricature stated "But iI have always voted the Democratic ticket." Niels would take the high road and responded with "Leave reference to my people out of their attacks on me." He would go on to win two more elections to the senate.

Source: Christensen Family Papers 1806-1999 Selected Chronologies #1

Source: Christensen Family Papers 1806-1999 Selected Chronologies #2

Source:Cultivating a New South: Abbie Holmes Christensen and the Politics of Race and Gender; By Monica Maria Tetzlaff; Taylor and Preston; Salem, Mass.

Source:Entangled by White Supremacy: Reform in World War I-era South Carolina

By Janet Hudson

* Link: http://library.sc.edu/socar/mnscrpts/christensen2.html

• Link http://library.sc.edu/socar/mnscrpts/christensen1.html
• Link:https://books.google.com/books?id=XQIfAfyUmr4C&pg=PA2&lpg=PA2&dq=ru...
• Link:https://books.google.com/books?id=9oPWcTenyBEC&pg=PA56&lpg=PA56&dq=... ____________________________________________________________________________

Statement of Payment

B. L. Crowe, being duly sworn, states that he is the Superintendent in charge of the office of Pinkerton's National Detective Agency in Cincinnati, Ohio, through which office the said Agency rendered services to the State of South Carolina, by direction and authority of Niels Christensen, Jr. of Beaufort, South Carolina, in the matter of investigation of the State Dispensary Board. That the said Niels Christensen, Jr. gave a written guarantee, binding himself and the firm of Niels Christensen & Sons, of Beaufort, South Carolina, as sureties for the payment of our bills for services to the State of South Carolina. That bills for said services were rendered from time to time as shown by statement hereto attached, market Exhibit A and that said bills have been paid in full as shown on said Exhibit A and on statement hereto attached, marked Exhibit B. That the item on Exhibit A under date of December 13th "By cash on account credited on bill No. 2146 -$100.00; and the item on Exhibit B under date of October 13th, "By cash on account $127.23, were paid as affiant is informed and believes, by said Niels Christensen, Jr., out of his personal funds that all other payments or credits mentioned in said Exhibit B were paid, as affiant is informed and believes, out of funds provided for that purpose by the State of South Carolina.

B.L. CROWE

Subscribed and sworn to before me this 14th day of December, nineteen hundred and six; FRANK H. FREERICKS, Notary Public, Hamilton County, Ohio
Source:Report of State Officers, Board and Committees to the General Assembly of ... By South Carolina. General Assembly at the regular session 1907

• Linkhttps://books.google.com/books?id=3ncbAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA587&lpg=PA587&d... _____________________________________________________________________

Death: Car Accident 1939

Niel's Christensen would be killed in car accident August 19, 1939. He and companion, W. E. Richardson, were traveling from Washington to Columbia when they hit a slippery patch of road, overturning the vehicle. Mr. Richardson obtained slight injury. Mr. Christensen obtained injuries to the spinal cord , resulting in his death.

Note: See newspaper article on accident below:

Source: The Sunday Spartenburg Herald-Journal; Spartenburg, S.C., Sunday morning, August 20, 1939

Link: https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1876&dat=19390820&id=GFosAAA...