Dear Lorri, your own story is instructive too. Many antislavery New Englanders moved due west to settle the Midwest, just as Southerners moved due west to settle LA and TX. As the former Western Reserve, Ohio especially is marked by Yankee migration. The area around Oberlin was a real hotbed of abolitionism, with daring fugitive rescues…
Dear Lorri, your own story is instructive too. Many antislavery New Englanders moved due west to settle the Midwest, just as Southerners moved due west to settle LA and TX. As the former Western Reserve, Ohio especially is marked by Yankee migration. The area around Oberlin was a real hotbed of abolitionism, with daring fugitive rescues and a couple of John Brown's raiders. If your people hail from OH-IN-Il's southern-settled "butternut counties" along the Ohio River, well, that's also where Lincoln and Grant grew up, a proud heritage. Digging into your family and local history might provide some common ground for you all, plus the guilty pleasure of seeing someone else shocked. Last year I was surprised to learn about distant cousins descended from former Confederates -- living in Brazil! (I still prefer my direct ancestor whose name is on the Pennsylvania Memorial at Gettysburg.) There is an opportunity for your family to see yourselves from a fresh perspective.
It reminds me of the "awful" genealogical research findings of a "rabid" supporter of Québec's independence and surnamed "Phaneuf" ; un bon québecois, quoi? He found his Canadian origins in Newfoundland...a good Scots immigrant named "Farnsworth" !
Western Reserve - Connecticut's Western Reserve. In Hudson, Ohio the now Western Reserve Academy was originally built as Western Reserve College, a replica of the Yale campus in New Haven. For those interested in seeing what Yale looked like in the 1830s visit WRA, fence and all.
I grew up in the Firelands or "Sufferers Lands" of north central Ohio. Many of our towns, townships and inhabitants share the names and descendants from the towns in Connecticut where their homes were burned during the Revolutionary War. These include towns and townships in Erie, Ottawa, Ashland, Huron and part of Lorain Counties-Danbury, Fairfield, Florence, Greenfield, Groton, Huron, Lyme, Milan, New Haven, New London and Norwalk to name a few.
War is hell. Gen. Washington's breadbasket of central New York State was also burned by British Canadians and displaced Iroquois. That would be interesting to track if an outflow of people named their new towns after those of the Mohawk Valley.
Dear Lorri, your own story is instructive too. Many antislavery New Englanders moved due west to settle the Midwest, just as Southerners moved due west to settle LA and TX. As the former Western Reserve, Ohio especially is marked by Yankee migration. The area around Oberlin was a real hotbed of abolitionism, with daring fugitive rescues and a couple of John Brown's raiders. If your people hail from OH-IN-Il's southern-settled "butternut counties" along the Ohio River, well, that's also where Lincoln and Grant grew up, a proud heritage. Digging into your family and local history might provide some common ground for you all, plus the guilty pleasure of seeing someone else shocked. Last year I was surprised to learn about distant cousins descended from former Confederates -- living in Brazil! (I still prefer my direct ancestor whose name is on the Pennsylvania Memorial at Gettysburg.) There is an opportunity for your family to see yourselves from a fresh perspective.
It reminds me of the "awful" genealogical research findings of a "rabid" supporter of Québec's independence and surnamed "Phaneuf" ; un bon québecois, quoi? He found his Canadian origins in Newfoundland...a good Scots immigrant named "Farnsworth" !
Western Reserve - Connecticut's Western Reserve. In Hudson, Ohio the now Western Reserve Academy was originally built as Western Reserve College, a replica of the Yale campus in New Haven. For those interested in seeing what Yale looked like in the 1830s visit WRA, fence and all.
I grew up in the Firelands or "Sufferers Lands" of north central Ohio. Many of our towns, townships and inhabitants share the names and descendants from the towns in Connecticut where their homes were burned during the Revolutionary War. These include towns and townships in Erie, Ottawa, Ashland, Huron and part of Lorain Counties-Danbury, Fairfield, Florence, Greenfield, Groton, Huron, Lyme, Milan, New Haven, New London and Norwalk to name a few.
War is hell. Gen. Washington's breadbasket of central New York State was also burned by British Canadians and displaced Iroquois. That would be interesting to track if an outflow of people named their new towns after those of the Mohawk Valley.
https://www.dundurn.com/books_/t22117/a9781550022711-the-burning-of-the-valleys