Ramping up for another pilgrimage

There are moments, some of them very long, when I feel crazy for trying this again.

After failing to execute the Michigan pilgrimage in May, here I am again, knocking myself out preparing and planning. And this one, rather than being four very quick days, is sixteen days long, involves four states and 21 cemeteries.  Seven nights we’re staying with family & friends and eight nights in hotels.

BUT, I’m very excited about this trek.  In addition to cemeteries we’re visiting The Roswell P Flower Memorial Library in Watertown, New York, Sage Chapel at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, and Greenwood Gardens in Millburn, New Jersey.

Flowers Rotunda by Frederick Stymetz Lamb

ROSWELL P FLOWER MEMORIAL LIBRARY

Through Mark’s 5x great-grandfather William Rollinson, the family is connected to Joseph & Richard Lamb who began J & R Lamb Studios in 1857.  They were known as church decorators, or ecclesiastical interior artists, but their specialty was, and remains, stained glass.   Joseph’s sons, Charles Rollinson Lamb and Frederick Stymetz Lamb, along with Charles’ wife Ella Condie Lamb, were responsible for a great deal of the interior of this Library, completed in 1904.  Photos cannot possibly do it justice; we want to see this work in person.

SAGE CHAPEL at Cornell University

The mosaic decoration of the apse at the east end of Sage Chapel was created by J & R Lamb Studios.  As it was being completed in 1900 it was considered “the largest series of figure mosaics ever executed in America”. *

GREENWOOD GARDENS

There are so many angles from which Mark is connected to William Whetten Renwick.  The simplest is that he was Mark’s grandmother’s uncle.  At any rate, WWR was an architect and artist whose self-designed estate, Vine Clad, was a showcase for his highly creative mind.  In 1906 his neighbor, Joseph P Day, commissioned WWR to work his magic designing Day’s estate.  The result was Pleasant Days, a 28-acre wonderland.  Through financial decline the property changed hands and was parceled out.  Greenwood Gardens was created from the remaining grounds, including the main house and several out-buildings; in 2003 it  became a nonprofit and has been recognized by the National Register of Historic Places as significant for its history, design & beautiful execution.

How fortunate are we that we get to visit these amazing works of art?

*  http://ecommons.cornell.edu/bitstream/1813/3164/14/002_13.pdf

J & R Lamb Studios:  http://www.lambstudios.com/
Roswell P Flower Memorial Library:  http://www.watertown-ny.gov/index.asp?NID=466
Sage Chapel:  http://www.curw.cornell.edu/sage.html
Greenwood Gardens:  http://www.greenwoodgardens.org/index.php

The images are from:

http://www.watertown-ny.gov/index.asp?NID=454
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cazatoma/4918235860/
http://tinyurl.com/2fcnhdf

A new chart challenge

The tremendous chart below consists, in the main, of three surnames – JANNEY, RENWICK and WHITTINGHAM – and is the result of two curiosities that relate to Mark’s grandmother Virginia Whittingham.

Since exploring her family tree, I’d wondered how Virginia was related to Belle (Isabelle), Boo (Ilka) and Bea (Beatrice), the children of William Whetten Renwick.  I’d seen a ship’s manifests on which young Virginia was traveling with the Renwick family and I have two photos of Virginia playing with Belle, Boo and Bea in the backyard of their idiosyncratic neoclassical-cum-Italianate home in Millburn, NJ.  But that curiosity wasn’t strong enough for me to put everything else aside to figure it out.  Then yesterday a compelling anomaly came to light: a “Janney” where I didn’t expect one.  Virginia’s maternal ancestry is 99.92% Quaker, with lots of Janneys in the mix.  Finding a Janney married to a Renwick was a little disorienting.  So, I went exploring.

So it is that Virginia is cousins to Belle, Boo and Bea from two directions.

1)    Virginia’s father’s brother (Walton Condit Whittingham) married Elizabeth Brevoort Renwick who is a niece of Margaret Janney, who is second cousin to Virginia’s grandmother (Cornelia Miller Stabler).

2)    Virginia’s father (William Rollinson Whittingham) and Belle, Boo & Bea’s father (William Whetton Renwick) are brothers-in-law.

Six generations of Quaker mothers

These six photos were set in a hand-made rough-hewn wood frame by my husband’s grandmother Virginia, aka GiMa.  Unfortunately the presentation did not stand the test of time.  When I remarked about it Mark just said ‘Yeah, GiMa was crazy about scotch tape’.  Yesterday I took it all apart, removing the scotch tape from the glass and cardboard backing between which each photo was sandwiched, and scanned them all.  Soon they’ll make their way to the photo restorer who may or may not be able to assist.  I’ll get new glass and fashion a backing that should hold for some time to come.  In the meantime I thought I’d share them.

Mary Gibson married Elisha Janney in 1795.  Elisha’s grandfather was Joseph Janney who, in 1683 at eight years of age, emigrated with his family from Cheshire, England in the “Endeavor”.  Mary was Elisha’s second wife; he was married to Albinah Gregg in 1786 but she died after 17 months, leaving a 7-month-old daughter.  Out of synch with the times, it took him 7.5 years to remarry.  Mary’s father, Joseph, is recorded to have been born in Pennsylvania, and her mother, Alice Jackson, in County Meath, Ireland.  They were married in 1724 in Ireland and traveled together to America in 1728, residing in Chester County, Pennsylvania.

Anna Janney married Robert Hartshorne Miller in 1823.  Robert’s 2x great-grandfather Gayen Miller was from Ballynalich, Antrim, Northern Ireland.  He and his wife Margaret (Henderson) and probably their first two children emigrated before 1702; they were among the first settlers of Kennett, Pennsylvania.  Robert’s 3x great-grandfather Richard Hartshorne, fleeing religious persecution, in 1669 left an ancestral freehold in Leicestershire, England and settled in Rhode Island then moved to New Jersey.

Cornelia Janney Miller married Francis Stabler in 1850.  Francis’s grandfather Edward Stabler emigrated from York, England to Pennsylvania in 1753.  Francis’ father, Edward Jr, established an apothecary in 1792, which served, throughout its history, Martha Washington (a family friend) and Union troops during the Civil War.  There’s a spot on the counter which marks the place Robert E Lee had been standing when a messenger ran in with a note calling him to Harper’s Ferry to deal with John Brown.  After having survived moving locations, taking on a partner, being inherited twice and changing names, it finally closed during the Great Depression.  Many years later the building and its contents was purchased by a historical society and was opened to the public, just as it stood, as a museum.  In 1982 The Stabler-Leadbeater Apothecary Museum (Alexandria, VA) was placed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Anna Miller Stabler married William Rollinson Whittingham.  William’s family has such an illustrious past it would be difficult to summarize.  His 2x great-grandfather Richard Whittingham emigrated from Birmingham, England on the “Union of Baltimore” in 1791.  His grandfather and namesake was the Fourth Episcopal Bishop of Maryland.  His father was a physician & surgeon who served at Gettysburg.  Another 2x great-grandfather, William Rollinson, also from Birmingham, England, emigrated in 1788 and, in 1789, was contracted by General Knox to “chase” the buttons that were on George Washington’s Inaugural Coat.  (see blog entry for Jan 19)

Virginia Whittingham married Lawrence Soule Apsey.  One of Lawrence’s 8x great-grandfather was George Soule who emigrated in 1620 on the Mayflower.  His Soule line, as recently as his grandfather, was still being born in Duxbury.  On the Apsey side, his grandfather William Stokes Apsey, emigrated from Dorset, England with his parents and two siblings in 1848 and spent his life as a Baptist minister.  In his adulthood, Lawrence became a prominent attorney and a Quaker and was one of the founders of the Alternatives to Violence Program (AVP) which teaches non-violence in prisons.

Margery Stabler Apsey was my husband’s mother; his father is still living and his identity won’t be openly divulged.  Margery was killed by a drunk driver when Mark was 10.  Virginia & Larry stepped in to help fill the breech and, based on how Mark and his brother turned out, they did a pretty good job.

Two Reverend Authors

On his mother’s side, one of Mark’s 3x great-grandfather’s was the Fourth Episcopal Bishop of Maryland, the Right Reverend William Rollinson Whittingham.

On his father’s side, his grandmother’s cousin Valeria Harris married James Huntington Symington.  Jim’s grandfather, Charles Kuhn Harrison was cousin to Reverend Hall Harrison.The connection?  A small book published in 1875 in Baltimore & New York.  It’s title: Anglican Catholicity Vindicated Against Roman Innovations: in the Answer to Isaac Casaubon to Cardinal Perron.*  In small letters, it says:  Reprinted from the translation published by authority in 1612, with an introduction, table of contents and full index.

It was prepared by Rev. William Rollinson Whittingham  and Rev. Hall Harrison.

* Download from:  http://tinyurl.com/292cyp6

UPDATE 10/21/2010.

Hall Harrison had been a student at St James School, graduating in 1854.  I’m embarrassed to say that until this morning I hadn’t realized that St James School, established in 1842, had been founded by Rev William Rollinson Whittingham!  That early in the life of the school they probably would have had quite a bit of interaction and gotten to know one another very well.

Touching the garment-hem of greatness

William Rollinson was one of Mark’s 5x great-grandfathers on his mother’s side.  Born in 1762 in Dudley, Worcester, England, he was brought into the profession of “chaser of fancy buttons”.  (To “chase” is to ornament [metal] by indenting with a hammer and tools without a cutting edge.)  He emigrated to America in 1788.  The following year, he was called upon by General Knox, the country’s first Secretary of War, to “chase” the arms of the U.S. on the gilt buttons on Washingtons inaugural coat.

Button from George Washington's Inaugural Coat

I had to ask myself how that happened.  How does a bloke who is new to a country come to the attention of the leaders of the new nation?  It took a conversation with Mark to bring it all into clear view.  Upon reflection, he mentioned that Washington was a Mason and maybe Rollinson was, too.  First I looked up General Knox, because there was so much more written about him than about Rollinson; sure enough, Knox was a Mason.

I decided, finally, to try to search online for that phrase “chaser of fancy buttons”.  Two different references contained those exact words:

• History of the Rise and Progress of the Arts of Design in the United States by William Dunlap, 1834
• Transactions of the American Lodge of Research for Free and Accepted Masons by Johnson & Wright, 1939.

The first book is where I had learned the phrase “chaser of fancy buttons”.  The second one contained the phrase under the heading of Early Masonic Engravers in America.  Bingo.  In addition to mentioning the other highlights of William Rollinson’s career as an engraver ** it says that he was Master of Jerusalem Lodge No. 4 in 1794 and of Phoenix Lodge No. 11 in 1795-7 and 1800.

**  his career included an engraving of Alexander Hamilton, quickly finished under public pressure after Hamilton perished at the hand of Aaron Burr, and the invention of a machine to rule waved lines, a great improvement in bank note engraving.

NOTE: The button in the photograph was at auction in 2008; the opening bid was $1 but was expected to top out between $4500 and $6500.  http://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/6135835