Ybor City, Tampa, Florida- Not so Wordless Wednesday

Ybor City is a historic neighborhood in Tampa, Florida, named after Vicente Martinez-Ybor, a prominent Spanish born cigar manufacturer.   It was founded by thousands of Cuban, Spanish and Italian immigrants who flocked there to work in the cigar factories.  It has been designated as a National Historic Landmark District.  Many of the old cigar factory buildings have been restored and rennovated as theaters, restaurants, a community college and shops.  Recently several typical small wooden houses of the era were removed from along Interstate 4 and rebuilt near the Ybor City museum and along Columbus Drive.  Each house has a plaque giving it's history.   Old streetcars have been restored to run through the center of Ybor City.

The immigration memorial is located in Centennial Park, across the street from the Ybor City Museum.  The walls surrounding this statue are inscribed with the names of hundreds of immigrant families.   The statue was dedicated in 1992.

The Ybor City Museum

http://www.ybormuseum.org/

located in the 1923 Ferlita Bakery Building

For more information:

http://www.ybor.org/   The Ybor City Chamber of Commerce website

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ybor_City   an article about the history of the Ybor City neighborhood of Tampa

http://www.tampapix.com/yborimmig.htm  The Ybor City Centennial Park Immigrant Memorial Website

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Copyright 2011, Heather Wilkinson Rojo

In the cellar? - Tombstone Tuesday

This gravestone was found in the basement of the 1804 house being rennovated by a cousin in Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts (for the story on the rennovation project, please see the link http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2011/03/1804-house-and-some-family-connections.html ).  This stone was facedown for many years, and it surprised the new owners when it was uprighted and discovered to be a gravestone. It is thought this child was buried somewhere on the property in 1836. The stone will eventually be removed and placed in one of the town cemeteries.

ISREAL FORSTER

son of Dr. E. W. and Charlotte E.

LEACH

of Boston

died Aug. 3, 1836

AEt 4 ms, 7 ds

Charlotte Eliza Forster, born 19 January 1810 in Manchester, Massachusetts and died 31 March 1885 in Manchester, was the daughter of Captain Israel Forster and Hannah Story (Captain Forster built the house in 1804 for his first wife Hannah Lee) . Charlotte married Ezekiel W. Leach on 23 February 1835 in Manchester. Ezekiel was born 1 July 1809 in Manchester, and died 2 March 1842, the son of Thomas Leach and Hannah Norton. This child who died in 1836 was named for his grandfather, Captain Israel Forster.

Dr. Ezekiel Leach studied medicine at Amherst College and with Dr. George S. Shattuck of Boston, and recieved his medical degreee in 1835.  He belonged to the Baldwin Place Baptist Church in Boston, and lived there for several years before removing south for his health.  He died at sea on a voyage from Savannah to Havre, at age 33.  He left a collection of papers to the Massachusetts Historical Society.

The Leach Family of Manchester is related to me since we are all descended of Lawrence Leach and his wife Elizabeth (my 10x Great Grandparents). He lived at Salem, Massachusetts, and one son came to Manchester and another to Bridgewater. He died sometime before 25 June 1662 when his will was probated.

Also, Captain Israel Forster had a child, Hannah Lee Forster, by his first wife, who married Benjamin Leach Allen on 24 August 1824 in Manchester, Massachusetts. He is a distant cousin, on my Mom's side of the family. Mom's maiden name was Allen, and all the Manchester Allen's are descended of William Allen, born about 1602, and an original proprietor of Manchester. William Allen and his wife Alice Norman are my 9x Great Grandparents.

UPDATE-
This Forster child had ANOTHER tombstone in the local cemetery. It was a double tombstone with another sibling. It is supposed that the parents removed the single stone and placed it in the home when the second tombstone was erected in the burial ground. Recycling?  Yankee Ingenuity?

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To Cite/Link to this blog post:  Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "In the cellar? - Tombstone Tuesday", Nutfield Genealogy, posted May 24, 2021, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2011/05/in-cellar-tombstone-tuesday.html: accessed [access date]). 

Londonderry Database at NEHGS!

Today I received a message from the New England Historic Genealogical Society that they have just published the Londonderry, New Hampshire (Nutfield) Vital Records to 1910 at their online database. You can read the announcement at this link: http://www.americanancestors.org/Blogs.aspx?id=24517&blogid=124069


These records are also available at http://www.ancestry.com/  If you do not have a subscription to either website, you might have luck at your local library. Most libraries in the United States have access to Ancestry, and many, especially in the New England area, also have access to the NEHGS website. Both offer free limited time trial offers.

Other online resources for Londonderry records...

The Google Book Search also offers the Early Records of Londonderry, Windham, and Derry, NH, by George Waldo Browne, printed in 1908. This volume includes records from 1719 to 1762. Google Book Search also offers the full version of The History of Londonderry, by Rev. Edward L. Parker, which includes a chapter full of genealogies on some of the first families in Londonderry. Many other books on early Londonderry, Nutfield or Rockingham County history are available online through Google.

If you are not already familiar with it, a great resource for New Hampshire and Londonderry records is the New Hampshire Provincial Papers, sometimes known as the New Hampshire State Papers. I wrote about how to access this resource at this link: http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2010/08/follow-friday-new-hampshire-state.html The State Papers were published in forty volumes between 1867 and 1943, and they include town documents, Revolutionary War rolls, town charters, probate and court records. These are an invaluable resource for early New Hampshire ancestors.

Recently the LDS church website http://familysearch.org/ published the New Hampshire Birth records to 1900, Death records 1654- 1947, and marriage records 1637 – 1947. These are about 1.5 million scanned images of the cards you see at the New Hampshire Archives in Concord, New Hampshire. If you have questions about printed or transcribed versions of the vital records, why not look at the actual scanned versions of the records for yourself to clear up any discrepancies!

Please leave a comment here if you know of any other online resources for Londonderry records!

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Copyright 2011, Heather Wilkinson Rojo

2011 NH Mayflower Society Scholarship Luncheon

This year the Society of Mayflower Descendants in the state of New Hampshire is pleased to announce four scholarship winners of the Memorial Scholarship program at the May 21, 2011 luncheon at the Chateau Restaurant in Manchester, New Hampshire.

Front row: Alexandra Conway, Manchester, NH (will attend Brown University);  Katelyn Shaw, Amherst, NH (will attend Keene State College); Kyle Donahue, Natick, MA, (will attend Cornell University); and Erica LeBlanc, Londonderry, NH (will attend Suffolk University).  Back row:  John Payzant, Deputy Governor of the NH Mayflower Society; Dean Dexter, Governor of the NH Mayflower Society, and Heather Rojo, Captain.

The meeting was also attended by the Deputy Governor General, Harry Folger, and Alice Teal, the editor of the "Mayflower Quarterly", the journal published by the General Society of Mayflower Descendants.  They came as guests to the luncheon to award Governor Dexter a certificate from the "Order of the Hook" for his service to the Quarterly and in editing the New Hampshire newsletter "The Shallop".

For more information about the New Hampshire Mayflower Society, or the Memorial Scholarship program, please see the website http://www.nhmayflower.org/

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Copyright 2011, Heather Wilkinson Rojo

A Dozen Random Things about Nutfield

1. Nutfield, later called Londonderry, was the second largest town in New Hampshire in early colonial times. Derry, Windham and a portion of Manchester were formed from its boundaries.

2. In 1719 the first white potato (Irish potato) in the United States was grown in Derry

3. For the first census in 1790 the population of Londonderry was 2,622 and in the 2000 census the Londonderry population was 23,236 and the Derry population was 34,021.

4. The Londonderry Lancers Marching Band from our high school marched in 4 different Rose Bowl Parades, most recently in 2011!

5. The first tomatoes grown in New England for food were introduced by the widow of Rev. Morrison in 1822. Previously tomatoes were considered to be poisonous.

6. Linen from Colonial Londonderry was worn by George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. Londonderry produced much linen, and it was considered the finest, thus it was often found that other towns tried to sell cloth with the Londonderry label, so the New Hampshire House of Representatives wrote an act to have an official seal affixed to all Londonderry Linen.

7. Upon hearing of the attack at Lexington on 19 April 1775, George Reid marched with a contingent of men from Londonderry to Lexington and then to Medford, where they joined General Stark’s troops in the battle of Bunker Hill in June. Later in the war he attained the rank of Brigadier General.

8. Matthew Thornton was born in 1714 in Northern Ireland, but was a Londonderry selectman, President of the Provincial Assembly, later the President of the New Hampshire House of Representatives, and signer of the Declaration of Independence.

9. The first woman who claimed to bicycle around the world was “Annie Londonderry”, a mother from Boston who was sponsored by Londonderry Lithia Water in 1895. Her real name was Annie Cohen Kopchovsky, a Latvian Jewish immigrant.

10. The first American in Space was Derry resident, Alan Shepard.

11. Professional Baseball player Duffy (George Edward) Lewis is buried in the Holy Cross Cemetery, Londonderry. He played for the Boston Red Sox 190-1917, the New York Yankees 1919-1920, and the Washington Senators in 1921.

12. James Wilson (1763 -1835) of Londonderry manufactured the first pair of terrestrial and celestial globes made in America in 1813. The 13 inch globe sold for $50.

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Copyright 2011, Heather Wilkinson Rojo

Sinovas, Spain - Not So Wordless Wednesday

The parish church of St. Nicolas de Bari is located in the tiny village of Sinovas, in the province of Burgos, Spain.  This is the church where my father-in-law was baptized in 1931.  We have traced the family back to Manuel Rojo (born about 1750) and Juana Arauzo of Sinovas, and their son Tomas Rojo was baptized there on 7 March 1783.  Earlier records are not available in the parish office, nor at the archbishop's archives in Burgos.  The parish priest and villagers of Sinovas think the earlier parish records were hidden during the Napoleonic wars and never returned to the church.

The church was built in the 1200s.  The tower part of the church was built first as a defensive structure in the 11th century.  It was declared a National Monument on 9 July 1964.  The entire village of Sinovas has 134 inhabitants according to a 2008 report!

St. Nicolas de Bari Church
at our 2003 visit to Sinovas

a postcard showing medival decorations inside the church

this postcard shows the ceiling of the church

St. Nicolas de Bari after a 2010 restoration project

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Copyright 2011, Heather Wilkinson Rojo

Ela Family - Tombstone Tuesday

The Ela Family gravestones are at Forest Hill Cemetery, Derry, New Hampshire.  The Ela family lived in the area where Burger King and Rt. 93 are today.  It was a large farm. The first Ela in Londonderry was Samuel, who removed from Haverhill, Massachusetts about 1755.  The David below, married Nancy Fisher, widow of William Cunningham and had five children.  John married Sarah Ferson and had one child, who died young.  (see Parker's History of Londonderry, page 272)

DAVID ELA

DIED

Feb. 19, 1822

Aged 63 yrs.

NANCY

WIFE OF

DAVID ELA

and daughter of

DEA. SAMUEL AND SARAH FISHER

Died Feb. 19, 1837

Aged 90 yrs.

[note:  husband and wife died on the same day, 15 years apart]

In Memory of

Mr. JOHN ELA

who died

Jan. 4th 1811

Et. 43

Look here my friends so here I lie

As you are now so once was I

As I am now so you must be

Prepare for death and follow me

In

memory of

Sarah, wife of

John Ela,

who died

April 23, 1816

aged 66

 http://www.ela-family.org/israelelagen.pdf  From the Ela Family website, a link to a book Genealogy of the Ela Family, Descendants of Israel Ela of Haverhill, Massachusetts, by Reverend David Hough Ela, 1896
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Copyright 2011, Heather Wilkinson Rojo

Local Genealogy and History Events

GENEALOGY CLUB: For all levels of experience, meets second Fri. each month (May 13), 1:30 p.m. at Rodgers Memorial Library, 194 Derry Road, Hudson, N.H. 603-886-6030 or http://www.rodgerslibrary.org/


Robert Frost Farm ongoing Hyla Brook Reading Series begins May 19 at 6:30 PM at the Robert Frost Farm, Rt. 28 in Derry, with poets Deborah Warren and Derry’s Midge Goldberg, followed by open mic poetry readings from the audience. There will be readings on Juen 16, July 14 and August 11. For more information email Robert Crawford at bobik9@aol.com

Also at the Frost Farm, the Summer Literary Series begins on July 17th, 2PM with Lea Newman discussing the women in Frost’s life and how their impact is reflected in his writing. Also, Alfred Nicol on July 24th , Robert Crawford on August 7th, Carole Thompson on August 21st, and Herc Pappachristos on August 28th. See the schedule at http://robertfrostfarm.org/events.html

Genealogy Basics Workshop, May 24, 2011, at the Lawrence Barn, 28 Depot Road, Hollis, NH, taught by Diane Gravel, email director@hollis.lib.nh.us or see the website http://www.hollis.nh.us/library/

The Lilac Festival, at the Wentworth Coolidge Mansion, Portsmouth, NH, May 28, 2011, 10 AM to 3 PM. Celebrate the blooming of the first lilacs brought to America. Museum website http://wentworthcoolidge.org/ Remember, the purple lilac is the New Hampshire state flower!

28th Annual Strawberry Festival, June 4, 2011, Windham High School, Windham, NH 10 AM to 4 PM. Book Fair runs June 1st to June 4th. Buy books, play games, listen to music, and of course, eat lots of strawberry treats! Contact strawberryfestival@flowwindam.org or see the website http://www.flowwindham.org/strawberry.html

New England Antiquarian Book and Ephemera Fair, June 5, 2011, 10 AM to 4PM at the Everett Arena, Concord, NH – Over 50 prominent dealers offering old, rare and out of print books and ephemera. Free parking. Email parrpromo@gmail.com

Market Square Day, Portsmouth, NH June 11, 2011, 9AM – 4:30PM Celebrate the renovation of downtown Portsmouth, entertainment, products, food and three performance stages. FREE! http://www.proportsmouth.org/MarketSquareDay.cfm

Exhibit of the Civil War Diary and Letters of John Milton Hay, from June 27 – July 31, 2011, at The Fells, 465 Route 103A, Newbury, NH The Fells was the summer home of John Hays, President Lincoln’s secretary and confidante. These documents are considered invaluable primary sources on both the Civil War and Lincoln. See the museum website at http://www.thefells.org/

American Independence Festival, at the American Independence Museum, Exeter, NH, July 16, 2011, celebrating the events of July 16, 1776 when the Dunlap Broadside copy of the Declaration of Independence arrived in Exeter from Philadelphia. Listen to a public reading (complete with hecklers), march to Fife and Drum music, see cannons being fired. There will be traditional New Hampshire Artisans Village, plenty of food, music, sidewalk sales and children’s activities. Evening fireworks and a live band. $7 for events on the museum grounds. Museum members and children under 10 FREE. See the website http://www.independencemuseum.org/aim_aif.asp for information and advance tickets.

The 31st Towne Family Reunion and Annual Meeting, August 13 – 15, Salem, Massachusetts. For the descendants of William and Joanna (Blessing) Towne who came to America from Great Yarmouth, England and settled in Salem, MA about 1635. Head-quartered at the Hawthorne Hotel in Salem. The hospitality room will open Saturday evening, and there will be a banquet Sunday evening. The business meeting will be at a Monday morning breakfast. Monday afternoon we will spend at the Nurse Homestead, where we will have a picnic box lunch. Additional activities are planned for the three days and will be announced here and in future issues of “About Towne”. If you have questions, please contact townefolk@allies.com or see the website www.townefolk.com

Londonderry Old Home Day Celebration, August 17 -21, 2011. A five day event including concerts, movies, fireworks, parade, baby contest, a 5K road race, children’s games, and a townwide celebration on the town common. See the website http://oldhomedays.com// for a complete schedule and photos of previous Old Home Days. Londonderry is one of less than a dozen communities that have faithfully observed Old Home Day on the third weekend in August since 1899.