Born in San Jose, California in 1893, Norman Oliver Houston was the son of a railroad porter. Houston’s parents divorced when he was 12 years old and after than he lived with his mother and step-father in Fruitland, near Oakland, California.
Houston studied business administration at the University of California at Berkeley for two years, and then took a job as a clerk for the board of insurance underwriters. Houston returned to Berkeley only to have his education interrupted again by World War I when he was drafted into the US Army. He served as regimental personnel adjutant with the 32nd Division. He was the only man of African American descent to hold this position in the entire US Army. After his discharge from the Army Houston returned to Berkeley to attend summer school, but did not enroll the following semester. Instead he took a job as an agent with the National Life Insurance Company in Los Angeles, where he sold insurance policies to black waiters and cooks at the railroad commissary.
In the early 1920s William Nickerson, an insurance agent from Texas, arrived in Los Angeles to find most blacks in the city without insurance. Nickerson took it upon himself to rectify the situation by starting his own corporation to sell life insurance. Houston became Nickerson’s first employee, and in 1925, when Nickerson launched Golden State Guarantee Fund Insurance Company, Houston became the secretary/treasurer of the newly-formed corporation. The company prospered for many years.
In 1970 Houston’s two sons, Ivan J. and Norman B. took over management of the company. Norman O. continued to work in several capacities at Golden State Mutual until his official retirement in 1977, when he was given recognition as honorary chairman and chairman emeritus.
Only four days after his 88th birthday Norman O. Houston passed away on October 20, 1981 in Los Angeles.
Related Links:
• Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Company
• Ivan J. Houston
• William Nickerson, Jr.
• George A. Beavers, Jr.
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