The Life of Israel Alden

In honor of Thanksgiving and the 400^th Anniversary of the Mayflower, I wanted to learn about Israel Alden, my maternal 6^th great grandfather. Israel is the great-great grandson of John and Priscilla Mullins Alden. (click on highlighted names to view additional posts)

Israel was born to Noah and Joanna Vaughn Alden on 18 May 1747 in Stafford, Tolland County, Connecticut.

11 July 1765 Israel married Lucy Thankful Markham in Stafford, CT. 

Lucy and Israel would have 13 children: Israel, Noah, Timothy (my 5^th great grandfather), Lucy, Benjamin, Thankful, Samuel, Zilphah, Moses, Abner, Elisha, David and Ruth. Only their first child Israel was born in Stafford. The other children were born in Tyringham, Massachusetts. If oldest son Israel was born in 1766 and son Noah was born 6 March 1768 then Israel must have moved to Tyringham, Mass between 1766 and 1768.

14 June 1768 – Daniel Markham of Tyringham sold 41 acres of land to Israel also then of Tyringham, Massachusetts. Lucy also had a brother named Daniel but I believe they are referring to Lucy’s father here. Was the land sale the reason that the young couple moved to Tyringham? What was the area like when they moved there?

• This area was first settled in 1735 and began as a town named Tyringham (after a village in Buckinghamshire, England) in 1762 shortly before Israel and Lucy moved here. The town started as an agricultural community. In 1786 the town had 182 dwelling houses, forty shops, two tanneries, four potash works, two iron works, four grist and saw mills. From the town valuations we also know that the townspeople made 1185 barrels of cider that year and there were more than 10,000 acres of wooded land and a bout 2500 acres improved for growing crops. There were 500 horses, 800 swine, 178 oxen, 500 cattle and 541 milk cows. Quite a thriving community when Israel and Lucy were raising their family here.

Israel Alden served as a private in the American Revolution from 19 September 1777 to 16 October 1777 serving in the Berkshire County Militia.

In 1790 US Federal Census, the first census, and in the 1800 US Federal Census Israel and family are living in Tyringham, Berkshire, Massachusetts.

26 July 1792 there is a sale of their rights in the thirds set off to their mother Thankful from Lucy’s siblings to Israel. On the same day Israel and Lucy sell 54 acres to Daniel Markham.

12 March 1816 Israel and Lucy, living in Tyringham, sold 50 acres of land (lot #104) for $400. I wonder if they intended to move to Windsor, New York and this was their money for the new land and the move.

25 December 1816 Israel Alden bought 60 acres in Broome County, New York. The village of Windsor, where Israel lived, is located on the Susquehanna River. In 1805 Windsor had a population of 1,000. On 2 March 1807 the township of Windsor was created. I always wonder why my ancestors moved to a different location. What were the possible reasons for the move when Israel was 69 years old?

• In reading the book Binghampton It’s Settlement, Growth and Development I may have found an answer to my question. The editor William S. Lawyer explains that about 250 survivors of the Revolution came to this area and made homes for themselves and their families. As expected, I see “Israel Alden” in the list of Revolutionary soldiers who came to this area. Lawyer states “Nearly all of these patriots of the war for American independence were in modest circumstances, some of them very poor, while few indeed of the number could afford any of the luxuries of life as then enjoyed. They came to the region, as did other pioneers, hoping to benefit their condition and provide comfortable homes for their families. Their land was purchased at reasonable prices, and they at once set about its cultivation and development.”  Did Israel follow other soldiers of the Revolution to Windsor?

On 20 July 1817, only seven months after purchasing land there, Israel died in Windsor, Broome County, New York at the age of 70.

I am amazed at how far Israel moved in his life during that time period.  He was born in Stafford, CT.  He then moved his family to Tryingham, MA and later he would move them yet again to Windsor, NY.

If you have any corrections or additions or stories to share I look forward to hearing them.

Enjoy the journey,
Debby

5th Blogiversary of Debby's Family Genealogy Blog

A look back at the last year:

Over the past year I have created and published only 28 blog posts. This is about half of what I normally post… but wait a minute, a lot has happened over the last year. Everything in life was going well and in the second week of March I became the proud owner of a 2020 Winnebago Travato. I was making plans for retirement and getting on the road in my new RV. A week later Covid hit and everything changed in all our lives. Similar to many others I was suddenly working from home and everyone was trying to determine what exactly was going on and when our lives would ever get back to ‘normal’. I had a very difficult time blogging in March and April and May with everything that was going on. While I was safe many others were not. With the uncertainty of the time blogging just didn’t seem that important to me.

I continued to dream of retiring and taking my genealogy road trip. At the end of June I did retire after 35 years as a Special Education Teacher. Retirement during Covid was very different. Eventually I made the decision that I could safely travel in my camper with my dog Harley. I knew what to do to be safe.  I believed I could travel, be safe and still do many of the things on my genealogy road trip list. (see post Genealogy Road Trip 2020) After about 10,000 miles and a little over three months I am back home safely with my trusted companion Harley. The unpacking is done and I am ready to start blogging again … and adding to the list for the next road trip.

Some of my Favorite Posts this year:

Visiting the home where my grandfather was born and grew up - The History of the Warner Homestead and Visiting the Warner Homestead.

Going to places where my ancestors lived is so important to me.  Completing my post Gerald G. Warner, Land Owner was a success because I found my great uncle’s land in South Dakota and was actually able to stand on land that once belonged to him. 

Finding out about my great grandmother’s siblings (The Missing Rowan Children-Who Were They?), who died very young, was important to me so that these children would not be forgotten.

All time History Page Views - this year went from 96, 989 to 115,077.

Followers – this year went from 22 to 24

In Case You Missed Them, My Top Five Most Viewed Blog Posts Were:

The Missing Rowan Children-Wo Were They?

Visiting the Warner Homestead

The Wyoming Massacre and Congress

Genealogy Road Trip 2020

The Life of Merrit Howell, Jr.

What I’ve learned:

When possible, being able to actually visit repositories is invaluable when searching for those elusive records. (See post- The Twists and Turns of Finding Baptismal Records for 1878 )

Visiting the land/area where my ancestors lived gives me more insight into who they were and how they lived. I can’t get the ‘feel’ for an area from pictures alone.

Developing chronologies of my ancestors’ lives in a story format helps me better put together the pieces of the data that I have found.

My Frustrations:

Finding the time to write the posts about all that I have learned about my ancestors continues to frustrate me.  I hope that retirement will give me more time to write.

Several ancestors remain elusive but with time I hope I will learn more about them.

I have several projects in the works related to my ancestors and hope that being retired will help me accomplish them sooner.

My goals for this next year:

Now that I am retired, I am hoping to finally complete my edit of my paternal great grandmother Carrie’s Letters in a digital format so that my cousins and others can easily read them.

To once again publish at least 50 posts.

To figure out how to add writing blog posts to my agenda while camping. This year as I embarked on my first genealogy road trip I focused mainly on how my camper works, traveling with Harley, seeing family and friends and doing some research.

Accomplished:

I was able to meet three cousins (a first cousin, a second cousin and a third cousin) in the last several months that I had found through DNA. What an amazing experience!! I cherish the time I was able to spend with them and look forward to our time together in the future.

I have been blogging now for 5 years and have published 234 posts. When I look back that seems like a lot but I have so much discovered information that I want to write about. Now it’s just setting aside the time to write the posts and get the information published to continue to tell my ancestors’ stories.

Despite all that has been happening since March I was able to publish 28 blog posts over the last year.

A VERY SPECIAL THANK-YOU TO ALL MY READERS!  I enjoy the comments you make and/or questions you ask.  I’m always looking for new directions to search or information that is questionable and needs verification.

My updated Surname word cloud:

It has been an interesting, and at times, very exciting year for me as a blogger.  On to new discoveries and new cousin connections.

If you have any corrections or additions or stories to share I look forward to hearing them.

Enjoy the journey,
Debby

Genealogy Road Trip 2020

I haven’t published any posts in a while and if you have wondered why…let me explain.

At the end of June I retired from work as a Special Education Teacher. I had worked at this job full time for over 35 years. What to do next? Lots of Genealogy among other things!! Well, in March, a week before Covid hit, I brought home my first ever camper, a 2020 Winnebago Travato.

Several years ago I decided that to celebrate my retirement I wanted to do a Genealogy Road Trip. I started keeping a list on Evernote with places I wanted to go visit and basic information I wanted to learn. Yes, you can keep a list in many of the family tree software programs but this was a little different type of list. I arranged items/locations by states and that helped me plan my trip, more or less.

Harley and I started our “Enjoy the Journey Road Trip 2020” at the end of July and just returned a couple of weeks ago after traveling for over 3 months, 10,000 miles and visiting 27 states.

I decided that despite Covid I still wanted to go on my trip. I listened to the experts about how to stay safe and used all the necessary precautions I could to keep myself and others safe. As I was getting ready to leave on my trip my son suggested that before I begin this journey I should think about what my primary goal was for the trip and then see if what I thought before beginning was still true at the end. (Great idea and made me think of all the trips he and I took while he was growing up. I would ask him each day what his favorite part of the trip had been and saved many of those on a postcard from the place we visited.)

With Covid I knew that I had to be FLEXIBLE, that things were likely to change as I headed around the country. Along with genealogy information or pictures to gather there were people I wanted to meet. I had found and corresponded with several newly discovered cousins through DNA that I really wanted to meet for the first time. There were also family and friends to see. The answer to my son’s question before I started was…I wanted to see the people and spend time with them. The genealogy information could wait (a lot of places may be closed due to Covid) but the people were the top priority!

So, how did I do? I was able to meet one first cousin, one second cousin and one third cousin I had never met. I was able to see a dear friend I hadn’t seen in years, see other friends and spend precious time with my family as we created many new memories.

What about the genealogy research you ask? Well, I was able to visit a lot of cemeteries. That’s one place that is easy to visit during Covid. Several were way out of the way and it look some time looking but I found them!

Oh, where to begin looking?? This might take a while.

I think Harley was getting tired of traipsing through all the cemeteries with me but it was a good time for a walk. I only found one cemetery in Pennsylvania that stated no dogs were allowed.

I did get to add in some unexpected little side trips. I grew up watching old westerns and when I saw a sign for this cemetery I just had to stop…

(click on images to enlarge)

Gravesite for Billy the Kid

How ironic that as I walked in to the cemetery, good friend and fellow blogger, Diane Gould Hall would call me. Like she knew I was going in to a cemetery lol.

I found it very valuable to physically be in the areas that my ancestors lived. Yes, I could look locations up on maps but it’s not the same as actually being there. Physically being there gave me insight in to distances people might have traveled, how far they lived from each other, what the terrain was like, etc.? Talking to the people also led to new discoveries and/or new leads to pursue that I hadn’t thought of before.

I was able to visit two county buildings and gather information so I could go and stand on land ancestors had once owned which was so amazing! (See post Gerald G. Warner, Land Owner.  More to follow in later posts on other discoveries.) It was exciting to go back to my Evernote list and say…’Done’ next to certain items.

Hopefully, the next time I start out on my road trip Covid will be a thing of the past, or at least under control enough, so that I will be able to cross more things off my list. While driving I decided on another visual that will help me concentrate my efforts back East on searching all the different towns where my many ancestral lines lived. I also needed to figure out the whole camping thing as well as traveling full time with a dog. That adds a new layer to going and doing research. This is the main reason I didn’t do more blogging while on the road. Several posts were started but I was unable to finish them with everything else that I had to do and that I was learning about camping in general.

Well, my camper is unpacked, cleaned and restocked. Ready for the next road trip. I thought about the ‘purpose’ of my trip. My answer was still the same as when I began-to see and spend time with the people that I cared about.

A very special thank-you to all who helped make this an amazing trip! If I was unable to see you this year then I hope I will be able to see you on the next trip. 

What a beautiful country we live in!

If you have any corrections or additions or stories to share I look forward to hearing them.

Enjoy the journey,
Debby