New York

Biographical Sketch of Deacon Ebenzer Hamlin

(III) Deacon Ebenezer, eighth child and fifth son of James and Mary (Dunham) Hamlin, was born July 29, 1674. He occupied the homestead farm at Coggin’s Pond until about the time of his second marriage when he removed to Rochester, Massachusetts, now (1910) Wareham. He was one of the original members of the Wareham church which was organized December 25, 1739. He was chosen deacon, February 18, 1740. He was dismissed to the church at Sharon, Connecticut, May 30, 1742, which is about the date of his removal to that town and state. In his will he bequeathed “twenty-four pounds, … Read more

Biographical Sketch of Isaac Hamlin

(IV) Isaac, sixth child and fourth son of Deacon Ebenezer and Sarah dewis) Hamlin, was born July 1, 1714, died at Springfield, Massachusetts, 1805. He removed to Wareham where he and his wife were original members of the church in 1739 and where their eldest son Seth was baptized, March 14, 1742. He was dismissed to the Sharon church May 30, 1742. He owned a share in the Sharon Iron Works which he sold in 1749. He removed from Sharon, Connecticut, and his name appears on the records of Lenox, Massachusetts, June 11, 1777, where he bought land and erected … Read more

Biography of Captain Seth Hamlin

(V) Captain Seth Hamlin, son and eldest child of Isaac and Mary (Gibbs) Hamlin, was born September 9, 1740. His name appears on the records of Alford, Massachusetts, in 1793-94, but not later. He is believed to have died there in 1795. He resided at Sharon, Connecticut; New Concord, New York, and Alford, Massachusetts, where his name frequently appears on the early records, sometimes as Captain Seth Hamlin. He was a highway surveyor in 1777, and town clerk in 17831785. He was a soldier of the revolution, serving in Captain Wilcox’s company, Colonel Ashley’s regiment. He enlisted for three years … Read more

Biography of Elijah Hamlin

(VI) Elijah, eldest son and second child of Captain Seth and Mary (Pitcher) Hamlin, was born in Alford, Massachusetts, February 8, 1767, died April 12, 1858, and was buried at Clarkson, New York. He witnessed as a boy many of the stirring scenes of the revolution and related to his grandchildren many interesting incidents of those clays of hardship and danger. He removed to Barre, Massachusetts, and from there to East Bloomfield, New York, about 1791. He purchased and operated a farm there which is now (1910) owned by his grandsons, John S. and Frank H. Hamlin. He was a … Read more

Biography of Henry William Hamlin

(VII) Henry William, fifth son and tenth child of Elijah and Lydia (Pope) Hamlin, was born in East Bloomfield, Ontario county, New York, October 20, 1807, died there November 30, 1881. He was a leading citizen and prominent business man of Ontario county and for many years was engaged in various lines of activity; was farmer, trader, merchant, banker and successful in all his undertakings. He established a character for rectitude and uprightness that stands unsurpassed in any community. Of him the well-worn saying that “His word was as good as his bond” was literally true. His advice and counsel … Read more

Biography of Frank Harwood Hamlin

(VIII) Frank Harwood, second son and third child of Henry William and Sibyll Blackmail (Sears) Hamlin, was born in East Bloomfield, Ontario county, March 29, 1846. He prepared for college at Fast Bloomfield Academy, entered Yale University where he was graduated A. B., 1869. He decided upon the profession of law and entered Albany Law School, where he was graduated LL. B. in class of 1870, and was admitted to the bar the same year. He engaged in the practice of law for a short time in Albany, New York, then he moved to Canandaigua, New York, where he formed … Read more

Biographical Sketch of Christopher Avery

Christopher Avery, the founder of this family, was born in England, about 1590, and died in New London, Connecticut, March 12, 1679. There are several traditions as to his place of origin, one that he came from an old Cornish family, another that he was a native of Salisbury, county Wilts. According to one statement, he accompanied Governor Winthrop to Boston, on the “Arbella” in 1630, and a second account says he emigrated with the younger Winthrop, in 1631 and on the voyage formed a close friendship with the latter, which eventually led to his settling in Connecticut. Whether, as … Read more

Biographical Sketch of James Avery

(II) James, son of Christopher Avery. the only child of whom there is any record in America, and the founder of the Averys of Groton, was born in England about 1620. He accompanied his father to the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and lived with him for several years in Gloucester, and then removed to New London, Connecticut, where the first entries in the town book are the births of his three eldest children, who were born in Gloucester. He took up many land grants and built the Hive of the Averys “at the head of Poquonnock Plain in the present town … Read more

Biographical Sketch of Samuel Avery

(III) Samuel, son of James and Joanna (Greenslade) Avery, was born at Groton, August 14, 1664, died there, May 1, 1723. He was a large farm owner and most of his life a magistrate. For some time he was captain of the train band, and when the town was legally organized in 1704, he was its moderator. He became the first townsman, at the first town meeting in 1705, and held the position till his death. He married, October 25, 1686, in Swansea, Massachusetts, Susanna, daughter of William and Ann (Humphrey) Palmes, born about 1665, died October 9, 1747. Children: … Read more

Biography of Hon. Edward Hirsch

HON. EDWARD HIRSCH. – Someone has written, “There’s a divinity that shapes our ends, rough hew them as we may;” and the subject of this sketch is a living exemplification of it. When, away back in “the fifties,” he landed a poor boy in the city of New York, among strangers in a strange land, and looked about him for honest employment in any capacity, how little he dreamed that as years passed by he would hold the purse-strings for the then almost unknown territory of Oregon, when a few years later she should lay aside her swaddling clothes and … Read more

Biographical Sketch of James McCurdy

JAMES McCURDY. – This gentleman, who worthily bears the name of his honored father, Doctor Samuel M. McCurdy, was born at St. Andrews, New Brunswick, in 1840. He was early sent to school, and spent his time to advantage until as a lade of fourteen he began the work of his own maintenance, finding a suitable position in the general merchandise store of Vose & Joyce at Robbinston, Maine. Four years later he engaged as clerk at New York. In 1859, however, he determined to join his father upon the Pacific coast, and reached Port Townsend, Washington Territory, in September … Read more

Biographical Sketch of Frederick P. Stephenson

(III) Frederick P., son of Dolphin and Jennie (Porter) Stephenson, was born in Phelps, Ontario county, New York, July 18, 1869. His elementary education was received in the public schools of his native town. Mr. Stephenson married, in 1904, Jeannette Ve Le Munyon.

Biographical Sketch of Dr. James H. Stephens

Dr. James H. Stebbins, who was engaged in medical practice for about half a century, was born in Greece, Monroe county, New York, in 1834, and died in Geneva, Ontario county, New York, in 1908. He was graduated from the Medical College in Cincinnati, Ohio, and the greater number of his active years of practice were spent in Geneva, where he was one of the most prominent physicians. Dr. Francis Lansing Stebbins, son of Dr. James H. Stebbins, was born at Geneva, Ontario county, New York, in 1866. His elementary education was acquired in the public schools and he then … Read more

Biographical Sketch of Pieter Claesz Wyckoff

Pieter Claesz Wyckoff, the immigrant ancestor of the Wyckoff family, came from the Netherlands in 1636 and finally settled in Flatlands. He married Grietje, daughter of Henrick Van Ness. He cultivated the bouwery of Director Petrus Stuyvesant in Flatlands in 1655, having previously, in 1698, bought of Wolfert Gerritse Van Couwenhoven twentynine morgens in that town and in 1656 another tract of Wolfert. He was a magistrate of Flatlands in 1655-62-63, on the patents of 1667 and 1686, and a member of the Flatlands Dutch Church in 1677. Children 1. Annetje Pieterse, baptized November 27, 1650; married Roelif Martense Schenck. … Read more

Biographical Sketch of Cornelius Wyckoff

(II) Cornelius, son of Abram Wyckoff, was born September 11, 1823, and died in 1894. He resided in the town of Ovid, Seneca county, and was a farmer all his active life. He married, November 17, 1847, Mary Ann Swarthout, who was born in Ovid, Seneca county, December 17, 1826, daughter of Ralph and Catharine (Hurd) (Voorhees) Swarthout. Children: John, born at Lodi, New York, August 27, 1848; Ella, born at Ovid, August 18, 1856; Edson, born at Ovid, December 21, 1858; Abram Ralph, mentioned elsewhere; Bertie, September 29, 1865.

Biographical Sketch of Abram Wyckoff

(III) Abram Ralph, son of Cornelius Wyckoff, was born at Ovid, Seneca county, October 13, 1862. He attended the public schools of his native town and the academy and the high schools at Lodi and Ovid. He began to teach school and for several years followed that profession in the vicinity of his home. He began to study law in 1881, and was admitted to the bar in 1884. Since 1888 he has been practicing his profession. He was elected justice of the peace and served a number of years as magistrate and member of the town board of Geneva. … Read more

Biography of Colonel William Wilson

Colonel William Wilson, who has been connected with various lines of business, and is now (1910) the head of a large hardware concern, is descended from an old colonial family through his maternal grandfather, Captain Jonathan Whitney, who earned distinction in the war of the revolution. Colonel William Wilson was born in Seneca, Ontario county, New York, June 16, 1855. He was the recipient of an excellent education, being graduated respectively from the Canandaigua Academy, the Geneva Classical and Union School and Hobart College, leaving the latter in 1879 with the degree of Master of Arts. For the next two … Read more

Biography of Thomas B. Wilson

Thomas B. Wilson, prominent in financial circles of the state of New York, in educational and agricultural matters, as well as in the farming industry, is a man of many-sided abilities. His mind is ever occupied with weighty problems for the advancement and improvement of the section of the country in which he lives, and in this manner he furthers the welfare of the entire nation. Bold and enterprising, he has an undertaking far on the way toward completion, while slower intellects are deliberating over the means to be employed to this end. John C. Wilson, his father, was born … Read more

Biographical Sketch of William Harris Welch

William Harris Welch was born at Erie, Pennsylvania, December 15, 1862. He moved from there to Lock Haven with his parents the following year, and was educated in private and public schools, finishing with a special one year’s course in the State Normal at that place in 187980. During the next five years he studied and practiced civil engineering with his father, Edwin H. Welch, on the Pennsylvania railroad. In February, 1885, he entered the maintenance of way department of the Northern Central railway at Elmira as rodman. In June of the same year he came to Canandaigua as assistant … Read more

Biographical Sketch of Richard Vosburgh

Lee Vosburgh, a prosperous farmer of Clifton Springs, Ontario county, New York, and a man of prominence in the educational affairs of the county, traces his ancestry to the earliest settlers who came to what was then the wilderness of the state of New York. They have been farmers for many generations, and the land has been constantly and steadily improving in value under their capable management. (I) Richard Vosburgh, grandfather of Lee Vosburgh, spent his entire life in Hillsdale, Columbia county, New York, with which the family has been particularly associated. He married Caroline Van Dazen and they had … Read more