Friday, November 26, 2010

Dell (McCreery) Smith and a Thanksgiving Tradition


Yesterday was Thanksgiving Day and a perfect time to reflect on family traditions and gives us time to think about our family members who have come before us and left these rich traditions to carry into the future. Although the first Thanksgiving that was celebrated in Plymouth, Mass. is filled with many idealistic images for us today, I can't help but to think about my ancestors who were Mayflower passingers and wonder what their lives must have been like. William and Susanna White, their son Resloved White and Richard Warren can all be celebrated in my lineage and I wish to honor their sufferings and sacrifices upon the venture across the Atlantic to the wildreness of North America in the 17th century. But ofcourse I never knew any of these folks and I'm sure our modern Thanksgiving celebration little resembles the feast that they celebrated back in the 1620's.
In 1899 Dell McCreery Smith, my gg-grandmother, began a tradition in our family of hosting a large Thanksgiving feast at her home for her immediate family, which also including her parents, Lawrence Hobart and Annice Ann McCreery, and any of her siblings and their families who were able to come. Dell lived on a small farm with her husband Daniel Edwin Smith, Sr. in rural Henrietta Township, Jackson County, Michigan--near the village of Munith. This became one of Dell's annual gatherings until sometime in the 1930's when the family had grow so large that it was nolonger room to feed so many family members in her house. About this time her daughters step-up to the plate. Anna Smith Carley would entertain family members at her home on Sayers Road and Nellie Smith Walz and Lulu Smith would organize the feast to be held a few miles away at the Wild Cat Mill's hall in Leoni Township. The growing family would soon outgrow this arrangement and a new venue was needed. The newly constructed Richard H. Reno Post of the American Legion would fit the bill. Located just south of the village of Munith, the Legion Hall was outfitted with a large kitchen where the meals could be prepared, a large dinning hall with enough seating for the 100+ family could sit together to enjoy a grand family celebration. Dell would attend the festivities throughout the rest of her life, the last one she attended at the ripe old age of 101 years old in 1959.
The Legion Hall was large enough to accomadate all ages in the family. A television set was brought in to entertain the men with their football games. A record player and plently of records were brought for the teenagers to listen too and dance on the upper floor of the hall. Even the young children had activities that included making the table decorations. Not to mention the team of mothers, grandmothers and great grandma's who where were busy in that huge kitchen. It was a well coordinated event. It became so well known that in 1965 the Jackson Citizen Patriot, the local daily newspaper, ran a feature story on this big family Thanksgiving tradition.
While the large gatherings didn't last beyond the 1960's, the memory of our family gatherings have lived on through the stories and the snapshots that have survived. In the center of the image included with this post, Anna Smith Carley is the women standing with her apron on. Lulu Smith is seated just in front of Anna and next to Lulu is their mother Dell Smith. Thank you Dell, Anna, Nellie and Lulu for bring the spirit of Thanksgiving too our family.


Thursday, November 18, 2010

Sylvanus Lewis--Harford Cemetery

Years ago my cousin Stephen G. Fuller and I discovered a small rural graveyard on Wasson Road in Unadilla Township, Livingston County, Michigan. In the graveyard we located less than 30 individual marked grave sites which, included a few distant aunts and uncles. We found it interesting and helpful to know where some of the pieces to our family puzzle were located. The family names that we were searching for on that occasion were RISDON, FERGUSON, and perhaps LEWIS--but we just were not sure on our connection to the LEWIS' at the time. The little graveyard was also a bit confusing to pin down--it seem to have several names including Wright's Chapel Cemetery, Lewis Cemetery and Harford Cemetery. We have since learned that all three are correct--it just depends on who you talk too! During a later visit we diligently recorded the inscriptions on every stone we located and mapped there location for future reference.

After our visit, we began the task of sorting the names and over the last few years have discovered that most of the individuals laid to rest in the graveyard on Wasson Road had family connections to each other. Not too earth shattering of a notion! When we were able to finally connect our RIDSON aunts and uncles with the LEWIS' we discovered that there definitely appeared to be link between our GGGGG-Grandmother Clara (Lewis) Risdon and the folks buried in Unadilla. Clara (BD ?-c1840) was the wife of Almor/Aylmer/Almore Risdon (1789-1838). They lived in the vicinity of Vermillion, Erie County, Ohio and it was there in 1838 that Aylmer drown in the Huron River. It appears that Clara did not survive him very long, but, very little evidence has been found to verify this.

Aylmer and Clara Risdon had the following children:
1) Cynthia Ann RISDON Fox (1828-1882) m. Stephen Fox
2)Elcina RISDON (1829-1915)
m. 1) William C. SMITH, 2) Jacob BRINNINSTOOL, 3) Abel HARP
3)Adaline RISDON Harp (1830-bef. 1860) m. Abel HARP
4)Athaline RISDON Ferguson (1830-1862) m. William FERGUSON
5)Sylvanus Lewis RISDON (1833-1915) m. Alice V. NOBLE
6)Josiah RISDON (1834-1911)
m. 1) Julia VAUGHN, 2) Mary J. MOORE, 3) Caroline VAUGHN

Aylmer was married previously to Pamela or Parmelia NICHOLS and they had three children:
1)George William RISDEN (1818-1893)
2)Elial RISDEN (c1820-1901)
3)Eliza RISDEN (c1820-1864)

It appears that the family of Clara Lewis Risdon moved around a bit--Huron County, Ohio and Livingston County, Michigan. We see that Heman C. LEWIS (buried at Harford Cemetery) and several of his siblings clearly moved to Michigan from Ohio in the decade between 1840 and 1850. With the loss of both Aylmer and Clara their six children were orphaned and in need of care. It appears that all but the oldest daughter Cynthia, move to Michigan with their Lewis relatives. What was most exciting was discovering through the 1850 census that the mother of Heman and Clara was living in Michigan--here name was Cynthia! Then with the help of charts on ancestry.com we start to see the names Sylvanus LEWIS and Cynthia CHAPMAN as the parents of some of these other possible siblings of Heman and Clara. But the day I discovered the 1883 death certificate for Heman, I was convinced--he was definitely the son of Sylvanus LEWIS and Cynthia CHAPMAN.

Because I posted the remaining list of burials that Stephen and I recorded on Findagrave.com, I was surprised to see additional names listed recently on Harford Cemetery's postings. But lucky for me they were posted by another one of my cousins Richard Ramsdill of Stockbridge, Michigan. So I shot off an email to him to inquire about the source of these new postings. He send me a listing for the cemetery that incorporated transcriptions from 1943 and 1982 which included several names from stones that were not present during our 1995 reading. I returned to my files to rediscover our mapping. Would you believe we marked 18 sites where there appeared to be evidence of buried stones! Now there are only a few new recordings from these earlier transcriptions, but there is great evidence that there are additional burials in the graveyard. Several burials here also have foot stones that include simply the initials of the deceased. One of these new listings is for Sylvanus Lewis who is reported to have died on August 14, 1849 at the age of 83 years 11 months and 19 days. Wow! I have now located the burial site of another ancestor and I can be pretty sure of his location because there was indeed a foot stone with "S. L." inscribed on it. Interestingly, there are 4 more stones that appear to be buried in the vicinity of his grave site. I wonder if we will find a stone for Cynthia buried beneath the sod?

Now the planning must begin. We need to perform a little bit of cemetery archeology now. But in order to do that--I need to figure out who owns this property. In my adopted state of Pennsylvania--families own the memorials placed on the graves but I'm not sure about the laws in Michigan. I'm sure neighbors on Wasson Road would get a little freaked out if we just parked the car and began to unload shovels and picks. So I'm looking for some suggestions from any of my fellow genealogist out there on the best ethical and responsible approach to investigating these stones under the sod!

Also-a big shout out to Richard "Dutch" Ramsdill for locating the additional transcriptions! Dutch is one of the leading forces behind the Stockbridge Area Genealogical and Historical Society. Check them out at:

http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~misaghs/

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

John Grinnell and Rhoda Denning Grinnell



Thanks to my very distant cousin Laura G. Prescott, I now have images of the tombstones of my Great-Great-Great Grandparents, John GRINNELL and Rhoda DENNING Grinnell.

John GRINNELL (spelled on his tombstone GRINNEL) was the son of Nathaniel GRINNELL and Ruth CLARK and was born on 30 April 1773 in Tiverton, Rhode Island. Four generations before, his ancestors had settled in the nearby settlement of Little Compton, Rhode Island. Why Nathaniel located to Tiverton has remained unknown. The marriage between John and Rhoda DENNING took place on 14 November 1794, the location is not known. There has been much speculation as to her maiden name. Her tombstone records it as DENNING but other researchers have recorded is as DENNIS and DEMING. No conlusive evidence has been discovered on her ancestry. Rhoda's birth has been recorded as 25 May 1779, thus making her 15 years old at the time of their marriage. Her place of birth is sometimes recorded as Conneticut and other times as in Berkshire County, Massachussetts. Shortly after their marriage, the GRINNELL's left New England for western New York and settled in Farmington, Ontario County.

Western New York was the frontier at the time and John and Rhoda must have been true pioneers, clearing land and preparing themselves for lives as farmers. Little details are known about their lives. As of 1997, it was reported that the home they built in Farmington was still in use, some 200 years after it was first built. John died on 28 March 1828, leaving Rhoda with several children still at home to be cared for and reared. She appears to have remarried sometime following John's death to Mr. Henry PIERSON, a Revolutionary War veteran who also lived in the Farmington area.

Rhoda was known to have become a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church later in life. Although there was some speculation through the years that John and Rhoda were Quakers because they were buried in a Quaker cemetery. Rhoda's death took place on 2 June 1861, during the beginning months of the American Civil War. What a story she must have been able to tell--having grown up during the years of the American Revolution and living through to see the first shots of the Civil War. What changes she witnessed to our expanding infant nation.

The pioneer spirit was passed on to several of their children. Five of them migrated to Michigan and others to Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Their descendants are numerous.

John and Rhoda had a large family that included thirteen children. They were:
Phebe GRINNELL 1796-1797
Joseph GRINNELL 1798-1883 m. Sylvia SKINNER
Abner GRINNELL 1799-1880 m. Eleanor LANE
Morris GRINNELL 1801-1876 m. Margaret LANE
John GRINNELL* 1804-1889 m. Eliza ISAACS
Minerva GRINNELL* 1806-1865 m. Cyrus MOORE
Clark GRINNELL 1808-1842 m. Parnell ST. JOHN
Spencer GRINNELL* 1810-1876 m. Charity MALONEY
Rhoda GRINNELL 1813-1889 m. Jacob LANE
Caroline GRINNELL 1815-1861 m. James Berry
Ezra GRINNELL* 1817-1897 m. 1)Charlotte MURRAY, 2) Lydia MURRAY, 3) Caroline GARFIELD
Thomas B. GRINNELL 1819-1879 m. Sarah CASE
Hiram GRINNELL* 1821-1869 m. Nancy MURRAY

(* denotes that this individual migrated to Michigan.)

John and Rhoda are buried at the North Farmington Friends Cemetery in Farmington, New York. This cemetery has simply been refered to in many Grinnell genealogies as the Quaker Cemetery. The images of their tombstones have also been posted on the great website: Findagrave.com