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My grandmother, Jean Westerfield Hill's (1905-1984) house was filled with family paintings, photographs, and colorful stories about our past as well as artifacts handed down through generations. As a child, I didn't really pay much attention to the specifics. It was ancient history, but her stories were interesting filled with tales of hardship, heartbreak, betrayal, romance, and of fortunes made and lost. I remember these stories. It's a colorful history, this story of America, which I have begun to relearn through the eyes of my ancestors.
My investigation started with my innocently typing my great grandmother's name, "Florence Ketchum," in Google and being surprised to discover a wealth of information about her roots. Since then I've found that my family is directly descended from:
- the first runaway best selling author in America, the Harvard graduate and Puritan, Rev. Michael Wigglesworth (1631-1705). His poem "The Day of Doom" (1662) was a graphic description of Judgment Day and became a blockbuster hit. Every other household in America is said to have had a copy. The poem remained in popular print for 140 years. His uncle, Edward, was a divinity professor at Harvard.
- the parents of Benjamin Franklin. We're directly descendant from Benjamin Franklin's older sister Mary.
- a couple whose 1814 portraits hang in the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., Benjamin Tappan and Sarah Homes Tappan. They were the parents of two famous sons, Ohio Congressman Benjamin Tappan who founded the town of Ravenna, Ohio in 1799 and his brother, Lewis, who founded the American Anti-Slavery Society in 1833. Lewis helped John Quincy Adams successfully defend the slaves of the Spanish ship, Armistad, against certain death or a life of slavery before the U.S. Supreme Court. John Quincy Adams won their freedom. We descend from the Tappan's daughter Elizabeth.
- the first person to construct a steam locomotive in America, Thomas Rogers (1792 - 1856). His son, Jacob S. Rogers (1823-1901), left his $5 million estate to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to establish the Rogers Family Foundation. This fund still supports the acquisition of new works today. Before his son changed the name of the firm to Rogers Locomotive and Machine Works, the firm was known as Rogers, Ketchum and Grovsenor. I'd love to find any information on the Rogers-Ketchum connection. Florence Ketchum married William Rogers Westerfield (Jacob Rogers' nephew) in an arranged marriage. Did she have a relationship to this firm other than through her husband's family?
- a founder of Church & Dwight, of Arm & Hammer baking soda fame, John Dwight (1819-1903). His wife, Nancy Shaw Everett Dwight left a substantial sum to Mt. Holyoke College, where the Nancy Everett Dwight Art Memorial fund still supports the school's art acquisitions today. Her youngest daughter, Clara McFarland, was Florence's mother.
- a founder of the National Freedman's Relief Association in 1862, Edgar Ketchum of NY (b. 1811). He was also a trustee of Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute in Virginia. This is the school for freed blacks where Booker T. Washington obtained his education. Edgar Ketchum was Florence's grandfather.
- a captain of the U.S. Colored Troops toward the end of the civil war, Col. Alexander Phoenix Ketchum (Edgar Ketchum's first born son). Following the war during reconstruction, he worked directly under General Howard. General Howard later founded Howard University in Washington, D.C. Col. Ketchum was Florence's father.
- a plethora of lawyers, sea captains, and ministers
Among the stories that I have not confirmed is that we're Mayflower descendants and also descendant from the first couple to obtain a divorce in the New World, but I've only been investigating for less than a month. Who knows what I'll find?
Annemarie (Hill) Senol
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