Dr. Carleton Young paid a return visit to the Bridgeville Area Historical Society last month. He is a legitimate historian with a long career teaching AP history at Thomas Jefferson High School and an earned doctorate from the University of Pittsburgh in the history of education. His subject, “All about Family Education”, was an interesting discussion of his experience researching the history of his family.
The speaker began his talk by showing a conventional descendancy chart and illustrating the various confusing terms – great-great-grandfather; second or third cousin; and (best of all) second cousin, once removed. His research into his father’s family quickly determined the possibility of links to the earliest Pilgrims in New England. One potentially fruitful investigation led him to an ancestor who set out with the original Pilgrim party from Leiden in the Netherlands, but was left behind when the Speedwell was unable to accompany the Mayflower on its first passage. He did indeed arrive at Plymouth with the next contingent. Eventually Dr. Young hit the jackpot by pursuing another lead which confirmed he was descended from one of the original Mayflower immigrants.
This led to all sorts of interesting stories. He is descended from Susan Martin, hanged as one of the Salem witches, as well as from John Woodberry, one of the jurors who convicted her. Another ancestor is John Wing; the house he built in 1632 in Sandwich has the distinction of being the oldest house in the country that has been continuously occupied. Based on the Mayflower connection, Dr. Young is able to claim kinship with Paul Revere, all the Roosevelts, U. S. Grant, Ernest Hemingway, Richard Gere, and Taylor Swift, among others. Depending upon the source, the number of descendants of the original 102 Mayflower passengers alive today is somewhere between three and thirty-five million.
I am reminded of an old joke. Teacher asks third graders if they have famous ancestors. Johnny replies “One of my ancestors was admiral of the combined navy of all the nations in the world”. When asked for his name, he replied, “Noah”. If one goes back far enough, we are all cousins. The farthest back Dr. Young has been able to trace his lineage is eleven generations, to an English poet, whose name I failed to get. If we assume three generations per century, that would suggest this ancestor was born around 1600.
In addition to all of his illustrious relatives, the speaker also reported on a handful with sketchy histories. Particularly embarrassing was a branch on his mother’s side. Hillbillies somewhere in Fayette County, they were half of a well-publicized family feud which regularly made the front pages of newspapers early in the twentieth century.
Leesa Shady, who served as Mistress of Ceremony, took advantage of the evening’s topic to point out the resources available at the Bridgeville History Center for helping folks investigate their forbears who lived in this area. The most productive source is the collection of family history folders at the center. From its earliest days, the Society has encouraged everyone to record whatever they know about their families’ histories and to archive it in the History Center files. These folders are excellent sources of information about specific families. We encourage readers of this column to determine what is archived about your families and to supplement it if possible.
Another excellent resource, of course, is the United States Census. The History Center has hard copies dating back to 1890, when Bridgeville was still part of Upper St. Clair Township. That particular census lists twenty-seven families in Bridgeville and seven more in “Pughtown” (Dewey Avenue). Depending upon the specific census, there is considerable information about each family – ages, occupation, address, etc. Equally productive are the three Polk Industrial Directories, for 1910, 1913, and 1917. Each of them lists every family in Bridgeville, their address, and the occupation of each wage earner. Unlike the Census hard-copies, which are graphic copies of the original entries, this information is typed out and printed, and is very easy to read.
The Society’s Bridgeville High School collection covers the years from 1908 to 1960 in great detail. It includes nineteen yearbooks, as well as all the “Bridgers” (the monthly school paper) from 1943 to 1960. Another valuable source is the collection of columns I wrote following the workshops we held dealing with the history of the high school. It has been supplemented by a comprehensive list of all the BHS graduates in its fifty-two-year life.
Newspapers are an excellent resource. The Society has a file of digitized copies of the Bridgeville News for the latter half of the twentieth century, plus originals of a handful from earlier years. In addition, their subscription to “Newspapers.com”, provides them with access to a massive collection of digitized documents and a search capability to look for any desired name. The Canonsburg “Daily Notes” is full of articles about Bridgeville residents in the first half of the 1900s.
Old maps are a mixed bag. The 1905 G. M. Hopkins map shows all the houses existing in the Borough at that time, identifying the occupants of a few. The Sanborn maps of the same era show buildings in great detail, but no occupants. Nineteenth century maps are more productive; all the families here in 1855 are shown on John Poellott’s map. The same is true for the 1876 Allegheny County map.
The most valuable resource, of course, is the staff of dedicated volunteers who serve as docents at the History Center. The motivation for their service with the Society is a desire to research local history topics for the benefit of folks with questions; family history is a frequent question.
The next Society program is scheduled for 7:30 pm, Tuesday, May 23, 2023 in the Chartiers Room at the Bridgeville Volunteer Fire Department. Dale Saller will present “McKeesport 23 – One Town’s Remembrance of Viet Nam”.