Suffield Connecticut

Biography of Frank Whitman Roberts

FRANK WHITMAN ROBERTS – The surname Roberts is frequently encountered in the early records of New England. There were Revolutionary soldiers, farmers, business men, and seafaring men of that name, and their progeny is today scattered over the land, while many descendants of the older settlers of the name still adhere to the original soil. The seafaring men of generations past in New England were venturesome and enterprising persons, some of them whalers, others traders with the West Indies, whose islands then had even more glamorous and romantic atmospheres than they have today, although they are still glamorous and romantic. … Read more

Biographical Sketch of Newton S. Calhoun

Calhoun, Newton S.; pres. and treas. The Johnson Jennings Co.; born in Connecticut, Feb. 12, 1855; son of William E. and Almira Tracy Calhoun; educated, Suffield Academy, in Connecticut, and Brown University, Providence, R. I., graduating in 1879, degree of A. M.; married, Cleveland, 1884, Miss Caroline Jennings; issue, one son, Tracy Jennings, born in 1885, and one daughter, Carol, now Mrs. Lyman Narten; business career, taught school two years in the Providence high school; studied law while teaching and summers; one year in office of Judge Tillinghast in. Providence; came to Cleveland in the fall of 1882; in 1883, … Read more

Biography of Zerah S. Westbrook

ZERAH S. WESTBROOK HON. Zera S. Westbrook, the present deputy comptroller of the state of New York, has an interesting and instructive history. As a state official he is at this time a temporary resident of Albany, his residence and home being at Amsterdam, N. Y. His career is one which illustrates in a striking manner, the rise, progress and development of a character such as only can be found in a land of free institutions, without the aid of the wealthy, titled, so called nobility. As will be seen in a brief review of his life, he has already … Read more

Biographical Sketch of George P. Comey

Comey, George P.; manufacturer; born, Brooklyn, N. Y., April 21, 1858; son of George P. and Clara Dean Comey; educated, Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute and Connecticut Literary Institute, at Suffield, Conn.; married, Hinsdale, Mass., June 29, 1881, Miss Nannie J. Gill; issue, seven children, Clara M., Florence L., George Lawrence, Frederick Harlan, Ralph, Harold and Robert; business career with his father and uncle in New York City, in the manufacture of ladies’ hats and straw goods for two years, came to Cleveland in 1880, and engaged in the same business with J. G. Pettee & Co.; after three years bought Mr. … Read more

Biography of Israel Newton

ISRAEL NEWTON-The Newton family of Orange is one of the oldest New England families on record, the first American ancestor of whom we have positive knowledge having come to the shores of New England in the early autumn of 1639. He was one of the four men who came with Roger Ludlow, deputy governor, who had obtained a commission from the General Court of Connecticut to begin a plantation at Poquonock. Thomas Newton moved to Newton, Long Island, in 1636, and in 1645 was chosen as representative from Fairfield to the General Court. Deacon Israel and Lois T. Newton had … Read more

Hardships of the Early Natchez Emigrants

History of Alabama and incidentally of Georgia and Mississippi, from the earliest period

Taking the reader with us, to the settlements of the distant Natchez region, he will find that emigrants continued to pour in, upon those fertile hills and alluvial bottoms, from all parts of “his majesty’s Atlantic plantations.” Many were the hardships and perils they encountered, in reaching this remote and comparatively uninhabited region. It is believed that the history of one party of these emigrants will enable the reader to understand what kind of hardships and deprivations all the others were forced to undergo. Major General Phineas Lyman, a native of Durham, a graduate of Yale, a distinguished lawyer, and … Read more