Jay Tam
Competition Winter 2018-19
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Herşey Dahil Sadece 350 Tl'ye Web Site Sahibi Ol
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Web Siteye Reklam Ver
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Web Sitemizin Yazarı Editörü OL
Sende kalemine güveniyorsan web sitemizde bir şeyler paylaşmak yazmak istiyorsan siteinin en aşağısında bulunan iletişim formunu kullanarak bizimle iletişime gecebilirisni
The Mendenhall-Pierson Farm
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| General location of the Mendenhall-Pierson farm |
The trail begins when, on January 20, 1725, a tract of 214 acres is surveyed for John Huey. It was sold to him by Reece Thomas, attorney for William and Letitia Penn Aubrey (William Penn's daughter). The tract was roughly vertically rectangular, lying to the west of the Peoples farm and south of where Sanford School now stands. It extended south of today's Graves Road, which did not exist at the time. At some point very early on, 80 acres on the north end were sold to a John Laugherty, leaving 134 acres for Huey. I've tried and tried to follow that 80 acres, so far to no success.
When John Huey, Sr. dies in the 1750's, his land is left to his son John, Jr. I think John Huey, Jr. moved away from the area, and he sold the 134 acres in 1753 to James Philips. James Philips also didn't stay long, as he sold the property in 1763 to Uriah Blue. (The Philips name would stick around through James' brother William, who owned Ocasson (The Cox-Mitchell House in Hockessin) and whose descendants would later own the Greenbank Mill.) I haven't found much about Blue, except that his wife's name apparently was Mary Jordan. A James Jordan owned an adjacent tract to the original property, so if she was perhaps his daughter, that could be a link to the area. (I admit to being oddly obsessed with trying to figure out why people bought particular pieces of land.)
However, Uriah Blue owned the property for an even shorter period than Philips, as he sold the same 134 acres to John Wat in 1767. Here's one of the many confusing points -- in 1762, Wat also bought 80 acres from William Tate, which Tate had previously purchased from a Thomas Sheeran (I think it says Sheeran). I don't know if that was the same 80 acres sold from the original Huey tract or not. What I do know is that John Wat, in his 1783 will, gave one half of his 134 acre plantation to Robert McPherson and one half to John McBeath. I think they were his grandsons. I'm not sure if that means that each got 67 acres or if they each had a one half share of the whole thing. In the end it makes little difference, because in 1794 McPherson willed his half back to McBeath, giving McBeath control over the entire 134 acres.
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| William Mendenhall on the 1849 Rea & Price map. J Bowman is the Peoples Farm. Note the absence of Graves Road |
After having changed hands numerous times in the 18th Century, the property would begin a period of stability starting in 1808, when John McBeath sold 108 of his 134 acres to James Mendenhall for $1625.63. (My guess is that it was the 63 cents that really sealed the deal. He would have been a fool to let it go for a paltry $1625.) James Mendenhall was the builder of the 1826 Mendenhall Mill, just down the road on Mill Creek. It's unclear whether James Mendenhall resided on this property or not, but upon his death in 1839 the farm passed to his son William Mendenhall. It appears that William did live here, and he appeared on the 1849 Rea & Price map (seen above). Oddly though, it seems like his house is shown due west of the Peoples (then, John Bowman) house, not southwest where it should be. I blame this on the map and the fact that Graves Road is not yet there to help align the houses.
The reason I know which house was William's and the place in which this story intersects the recent story about the Mill Creek Hundred tax books comes with the next chapter in our tale. When William Mendenhall died in 1866, he left only two surviving children -- Edwin and Hannah. Edwin had already moved to Cecil County, Maryland, while Hannah stayed close by and married....George W. Pierson, son of our 1839/40 tax collector William C. Pierson. George and Hannah raised five children in their house on the south side of Graves Road, each with their own stories that we don't have time now to delve into too deeply. Unfortunately for George W. Pierson, he didn't have much time, either.
George and Hannah likely moved in with her father soon after their marriage in the early 1850's (they're shown with him in 1860), but George only survived his father-in-law by five years. He passed in May 1871, leaving Hannah with five children ranging in age from 18 to 5. They probably had some help, but I'm sure the kids did all they could to keep the farm running. The first to leave was Willard, who trained to be a blacksmith. Hannah purchased a few acres for him along Limestone Road, and he set up shop there, just north of where the Summit retirement community is now. The next was Sarah (or Sally, as she went by), who married William Highfield in 1881. It was she who later lived in the house adjoining the Montgomery Family Cemetery, and from whose children the Drejkas purchased their home.
Edwin Pierson married Ella Reese in 1893 and moved to a farm on Little Baltimore Road, next to all the Walker Farms. That left sons John Taylor and Hiram. In 1900, Taylor is listed with his family (back to them in a moment), while Hiram is listed in a separate household with his mother. This leads me to believe that the now-lost house on the north side of Graves Road (seen in the background of the picture below) was built either for Taylor or Hannah. In 1904, Hiram married Alice Ogram, and bought a farm from her father along Old Wilmington Road. That left only Taylor and family on the home farm with mother Hannah.
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| "New" Pierson house on the north side of Graves Road, seen behind members of the Joyce and Lawrence families |
John Taylor Pierson (who usually went by Taylor) married Carrie Louisa Kemper (daughter of Dr. Jackson Kemper) in 1886. The couple had four children: Elsie, Kemper Bryant, Howard, and Mabel. Sadly, Mabel passed away just shy of her first birthday, in July 1893. I don't know if it was related, but Carrie also passed three months later. Four years after that, Taylor married Annie Kemper, Carrie's younger sister (although this is a phenomenon that may seem odd to us now, was not uncommon at the time). They had one child together, Maurice, in 1901.
I would tend to believe that Taylor and family resided in the original house, still standing on the south side of Graves Road, for several reasons. First, the bulk of their farm along with the barn were on the south side of the road. Secondly, it was only two years after Hannah Pierson's 1911 death that Taylor sold 38 acres of the family farm to Lewis Colmery. The sale represented the portion of the property north of Graves Road, including the "new" house". However, that part of the Pierson tract would return to the family in 1954, when Kemper Pierson's daughter Helen and her husband George Houchin purchased the house and some surrounding land.
The main, southern, portion of the old Mendenhall, now Pierson, farm was sold by Taylor in 1924 to William H. Whiteside. All the children were grown and with their own families, and Taylor moved in with daughter Elsie and her husband William Oesterle in Wilmington. Whiteside doesn't appear to have lived on the property, but it looks like he leased the farm to his brother John. In 1940, the property was seized by the sheriff and sold to pay the mortgage that Whiteside owed to Kemper Pierson. The new owner was Matthew F. Judge, a VP with the Equitable Life Insurance Company. He turned around and sold it to a lawyer named Henry Wise, who it seems may have been the one to break up the land.
In 1941, he sold five acres including the old house, to H. Willis and Ellen Pyle Lawrence. Ellen was the niece of artist Howard Pyle, and was a noted artist in her own right. (Don't worry, there will be more Pyles in the next post.) The Lawrences converted the old barn into a studio for Ellen to work in. The house the Lawrences bought has several different build dates associated with it, all dating back pretty far. The county lists it as 1734, which is a very specific date (as opposed to the 1800 or 1900 that usually just means "really old"), leading me to put more than the usual amount of creedence to it. Someone, sometime, must have had a reason to give that date. Dick Joyce, whose sister was friends with the Lawrences' daughter, says he was told the house dated to 1780. The way old houses were regularly added to and enlarged, both could well be true.
If the 1734 date is even close to accurate, it would put the construction of the oldest section during the ownership of John Huey, perhaps as a permanent replacement for an original temporary home. It would also make it one of the oldest houses in Mill Creek Hundred. But, it might not even be the oldest house within a 1000 foot radius. We'll tell the story (or, at least, as much of it as I could straighten out) of this other historic home in the next post. And again, there will be more Pyles.
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| The Graves Road area in 1961, partially developed |
On the Case Again with Octavius Bear
My friend and fellow Cincinnatian, Harry DeMaio, is one of the most prolific writers I know, considering that nine books in his Casebooks of Octavius Bear series have been published since 2015, the tenth is coming in September, and the eleventh is in the works.
Book Nine is The Basket Case, in which a star ostrich basketball player is found dead in a New York City alley. A giraffe is suspected. The giraffe’s team coach calls on Octavius to investigate. No wonder Harry describes this as “Alternative Universe Mysteries for Adult Animal Lovers.”
And the hero is a bear with one paw in the world of Sherlock Holmes. I’ll let Harry explain:
“Octavius is a nine-foot-tall, 1400-pound Kodiak Bear/consulting detective/scientist/inventor/seeker of justice/mega-billionaire owner of Universal Ursine Industries/narcoleptic war hero/gourmet-gourmand/somewhat sedentary and grouchy just on general principles. He is a hybrid character somewhat loosely based on Sherlock Holmes and Nero Wolfe with some characteristics of each but definitely his own bear.
“Octavius, among his many talents and accomplishments, is a brilliant, self-taught practitioner in the wide-ranging fields of biology, physics, ursinology, voodoo, teleology, chemistry, apiculture and oenology as well as a first rate electrical, electronic, structural, marine, aeronautical, mechanical and chemical engineer. He has a few other interesting characteristics such as falling into brief, deep narcoleptic comas – side effects of his successful genetic experiments to eliminate the need for him to hibernate.”
Clearly, Octavius lives in a different universe than we do.
“Here’s the story: About 100,000 years ago, according to scientific experts, a colossal solar flare blasted out from our sun, creating gigantic magnetic storms here on Earth. These highly charged electrical tempests caused startling physical and psychological imbalances in the then-population of our world. The complete nervous systems of some species were totally destroyed. For example, homo sapiens lost all mental and motor capabilities and rapidly became extinct. Less developed species exposed to the radiation were affected differently.
“Four-footed and finned mammals, birds and reptiles suddenly found themselves capable of complex thought, enhanced emotions, self-awareness, social consciousness and the ability to communicate, sometimes orally, sometimes telepathically, often both. Both speech production and speech perception slowly progressed with the evolution of tongues, lips, vocal cords and enhanced ear to brain connections. Many species developed opposable digits, fingers or claws, further accelerating civilized progress.
“Alternate universes play an increasing level of importance in each succeeding book.”
That brings us back to The Basket Case.
“Aside from being based entirely in one location, New York City, and dealing with basketball, Book Nine follows most of the same patterns established in its predecessors with four major exceptions,” Harry says. “Octavius, who was somewhat sedentary in the earlier books, is much more active and directly involved in managing the progress and outcome of the case. The cubs fall in love with Noo Yuck. As I mentioned earlier, alternate universes play an increasing part in the overall structure of these books. Ursula has now become a dominant character.”
Ursula would be the Artificial General Intelligence Unit that has been an integral player in all volumes after Book Six, The Attaché Case.
Other series regulars include:
Maury (Mauritius) Meerkat – sidekick, narrator, detective, and theatrical agent.
Inspector Bruce Wallaroo – Irrepressible but brilliant marsupial; an international law and order genius from Australia; often calls on Octavius and Maury for support.
Bearoness Belinda Béarnaise Bruin Bear (nee Black) – Now wife of Octavius; very rich widow of Bearon Byron Bruin living in Bearmoral Castle in the Shetlands; owner-pilot of the last flying Concorde SST; Gorgeous polar superstar, with the Aquashow, Some Like It Cold.
Arabella and McTavish – Belinda and Octavius’ cubs – mischievous, energetic furballs.
Frau Ilse Schuylkill – Swiss she-wolf; housekeeper-cook; jet pilot and sharpshooter with other very strange and arcane abilities.
The major villain is Imperius Drake, a mad duck with dreams of world (nay! cosmic) conquest. Once a mild-mannered Mandarin Duck, he is now “Moriarty with Wings.” A brilliant but loony anitidae who has developed a serum to make the animal kingdom his slaves, he seeks vengeance for ridicule by the scientific community and the death of his beloved Lee-Li-Li who swallowed all his serum in a vain attempt to stop his madness.
Next up in the series is The Camera Case, in which a movie is being shot at Polar Paradise. An ingenue falls from her suite to her death. Murder? Whodunnit?
Book Eleven, The Würst Case Scenario, will feature artificial food and murder. This series has leghs!
The Basket Case is available from all good bookstores including Amazon USA, Amazon UK and for free shipping worldwide Book Depository.
Harry’s website is www.octaviusbearslair.com.
Cabo San Lucas, Mexico
I recently visited Baja California Sur — a state on the Baja California Peninsula in northwest Mexico. We stayed in Cabo San Lucas and also spent time in San José del Cabo, Cerritos Beach and Todos Santos.
The flight was an easy 2 hours and 20 minutes from Los Angeles International Airport. They are planning major renovations and expansion of Los Cabos International Airport which is badly needed because the airport has a tough time processing travelers when the planes from the United States and Canada all arrive around the same time. It can take an hour to get through customs and get your baggage after landing. The flights are going to increase as well with service starting between London and Cabo and South Korea and Cabo so European and Asian tourists in addition to the many Americans and Canadians.
The roads are very impressive in and around Cabo. My driver told me that the toll road from the airport was built for the 2012 G20 Los Cabos Summit of world leaders.
Our tour guide told us that Cabo only has a 2 percent unemployment rate. Tourism is the main industry and puts almost all of the locals to work. You can tell. The streets are clean with hardly any trash and there are very few homeless people.
We stayed at the Grand Fiesta Americana resort hotel and there were multiple layers of security. Cabo is very isolated compared to mainland Mexico so doesn't experience crime from the drug cartels. We did see the Mexican military patrolling for drug cartels on land and in water.
Our tour guide took us to a glass blowing factory, on a glass bottom boat out in the waters around Cabo and for lunch to San José del Cabo which is the colonial town and the quieter side of Cabo. The party town with the spring breakers is Cabo San Lucas.
On Friday night we celebrated Shabbat at the Cabo Jewish Center - Chabad Cabo.
On Saturday we took a trip north to Cerritos Beach which is the best kept secret in Cabo and maybe the best beach in North America. It is rapidly developing with new housing. There is a hotel and villas there and massages on the beach.
Then we headed to Todos Santos — a town on the Pacific coast of Mexico’s Baja California Peninsula, backed by the Sierra de la Laguna mountain range. That is where the Hotel California is which has no affiliation at all with the Eagles song of the same name but has an interesting history in its own right. Todos Santos is the quintessential Mexican town with all the warm and friendly Mexican hospitality you expect.
The last full day in Cabo we went whale watching. We caught the humpbacks near the end of breeding season before their migration north to feed on krill. We also used a hydrophone to hear mating sounds. The alpha male whale with the best song gets the girl to mate with and pass his genes on to the next generation of humpback whales.
The next day I flew back to LAX and made sure to get a window seat to see the amazing Baja California below.
I would definitely recommend visiting Cabo and other parts of the Mexican peninsula.
Viva Cabo!
More pictures:
Video:
EUROHISTORY: New Pricing for Our Books
Hello Readers,
As we prepare for the new titles being added to our inventory, we have reduced the price for most of our books by 10-20%!
We hope to clear much-needed space, while also making our publications more accessible to a wider group of readers...
Our storefront at AMAZON is located at: https://www.amazon.com/s?me=A3SHUOZBCCEYBL&marketplaceID=ATVPDKIKX0DER
Here are the individual book listings...
As we prepare for the new titles being added to our inventory, we have reduced the price for most of our books by 10-20%!
We hope to clear much-needed space, while also making our publications more accessible to a wider group of readers...
Our storefront at AMAZON is located at: https://www.amazon.com/s?me=A3SHUOZBCCEYBL&marketplaceID=ATVPDKIKX0DER
Here are the individual book listings...
To order directly, you can contact us at:
Eurohistory
Kensington House Books
6300 Kensington Avenue
East Richmond Heights, CA 94805-1618
USA
To pay by credit card, please call: 510.236.1730. You may also mail your credit card information to our address above or use our secure system by sending us an email at: aebeeche@mac.com
We also accept Paypal at our address: eurohistory@comcast.net
We accept VISA, MasterCard and Venmo
For readers in Europe, we recommend the you order our books from: http://www.hoogstraten.nl or from our UK Amazon site:https://www.amazon.co.uk/sp?_encoding=UTF8&asin=1944207104&isAmazonFulfilled=0&isCBA=&marketplaceID=A1F83G8C2ARO7P&orderID=&seller=AL8YJ353W9NU1&tab=&vasStoreID=
Lifecell’den Akıllı Kamera: SUPERCAM
SUPERCAM ile Sevdiklerinize Gözünüz Gibi BakınTeknolojilerle deyimler çok bağlantılı aslında. Mesela “gözün gibi bak”. Ne güzel bir deyim değil mi? Bir şeyin ne kadar değerli olduğunu göstermek için söylenir. Eski zamanlarda önemsediği şeylerden ayrılmak zorunda kalan insanlara güven vermek için.
Zaman ilerlese de ihtiyaçlar değişmiyor. Deyimler ve ihtiyaçlar da teknoloji ile birlikte yeni
EUROHISTORY: Issue CXIX – Volume 21.3, Fall 2018 nearly ready!
Dear Subscribers and readers,
Continuing with my personal marathon to get all of last year's magazines out ASAP...I am delighted to let you all know that tonight I finished putting together Issue CXIX – Volume 21.3, Fall 2018!
Inside this magazine you will find the following articles:
1. The Romanovs Adrift: The Imperial Family in 1913-1919, by Greg King and Penny Wilson
2. Obituary: Prince Michel of Bourbon-Parma – Last of the Royal Swashbucklers, by Charles B. Stewart jr.
3. Kadriorg – A Russian Summer Palace in Tallinn, by Katrina Warne
4. A Royal Wedding in Gotha – The Civil Wedding of Princess Stephanie of Saxe-Coburg & Gotha and Herr Jan Stahl, by Arturo E. Beéche & Marianne van Dam
5. Princess Helen of Serbia, by Coryne Hall
6. Centennial of the Romanov Martyrdom, by Arturo E. Beéche
7. The Wedding of there Duke of Sussex, by Edwina Tash
8. Queen Isabel's Iberian Forge, by Justin Vovk
9. A True Royal Wedding – The Hereditary Prince Ferdinand of Leiningen Marries Princess Viktoria Luise of Prussia, by Arturo E. Beéche
10. Royal News
This issue will head to print mid-week and mail by early April, along with Issue CXX – Winter 2018!
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Payment must be mailed by check or postal money order to:
Eurohistory
Kensington House Books
6300 Kensington Avenue
East Richmond Heights, CA 94805-1618
USA
To pay by credit card, please call: 510.236.1730. You may also mail your credit card information to our address above or use our secure system by sending us an email at: aebeeche@mac.com
We also accept Paypal at our address: eurohistory@comcast.net
We accept VISA, MasterCard and Venmo
EUROHISTORY: V Royal Gatherings in London – April 27-28, 2019
Dear All,
The 2019 Royal Gatherings in London Conference will take place on 27th & 28th April at:
SPINK
69 Southampton Row
Bloomsbury
London WC1B 4ET
We already have the following speakers confirmed:-
Stephen Patterson | "This Thorny Throne" - Russia, Royalty & the Romanovs |
Jeffrey Hyland | Government Houses and the Royal Family |
Colin Parrish | Frederica, Duchess of York - a Weybridge Princess |
Graham Viney | 1947 Visit to South Africa |
Coryne Hall | Alexander II's visits to Queen Victoria |
Susan Symons | Schlösser in South-West Germany |
Siobhan Clarke | Royal Babies |
Katrina Warne | Gatchina Palace & Alexander III's Rooms |
Alex Borg | King Farouk: More Sinned Against than Sinning? |
Arturo Beeche | Fall of the German Dynasties |
Stephen Patterson works for the Royal Collection & he is the co-curator of the exhibition at The Queen’s Gallery on “Russia, Royalty & the Romanovs” which finishes on Sunday 28th April. See https://www.rct.uk/visit/the-queens-gallery-buckingham-palace & we would recommend you going to see this exhibition.
Siobhan Clarke does a lot of lectures & tours for Historic Royal Palaces.
To book your place please e mail Arturo Beeche (aebeeche@mac.com)
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