Connections to famous people

[rudywoofs (Pam)]

are you related to someone famous, or a historical figure?  Let us know who you're related to!!!

 

Example:

 

Dr. John Harvey Kellogg is the 6th cousin 4x removed of Sarah Palin...

 

[Tom Wetmore]

Alexander Wetmore, a noteworthy ornithologist and 6th Secretary of the Smithsonian from 1945-1952 is my 5th cousin, 2nd removed.  (He is actually what I guess you might call a double cousin since through a maternal line we have another common ancestor that would make him my 6th cousin, 2nd removed.)  He has several birds from Central America named after him and the Wetmore glacier in Antartica is named in his honor.

Here is the wiki link to a bit more about him - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Wetmore , the Smithsonian page about him - http://www.mnh.si.edu/onehundredyears/profiles/Alexander_Wetmore.html  and his picture - 

 

Edited May 13, 2015 by Tom Wetmore

[Tom Wetmore]

William Wetmore Story (1819 – 1895) was an American sculptor, art critic, poet, and editor. He is my 4th cousin, 5th removed.  Here is the wiki link about him - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Wetmore_Story and a picture of him - 

 

 Although he was a Harvard Law graduate and lawyer he did not continue in his law career to follow in the footsteps of his father, Joseph Story, a Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1811-1845, who wrote a number of landmark decisions including the opinion in the famous Armistad case. He is best known for his sculptures many of which are in prominent museums and installed in public and governmental buildings and parks around the world. There are at least 3 of his sculptures in Washington, DC., including the bust of his father on display at the Supreme Court building and the statue of Joseph Henry, the 1st Secretary of the Smithsonian that stands in front of the Smithsonian Institution Building, sometimes, commonly know as the "Castle".

 

[rudywoofs (Pam)]

That's interesting, Tom!  William Story probably knew Vinnie Ream (1847-1914) whose sculpture of Abraham Lincoln is in the US Capitol rotunda..  Vinnie was my 2nd cousin 4x removed..  

  

[Tom Wetmore]

Yes, that would make sense that they would have known each other.  

[Tom Wetmore]

I think I may have posted this before, but tracing through my maternal line brings up some interesting connections to historic people in America.  My ancestry on my mother's side traces back to the Pilgrims that arrived in the New World on the Mayflower.  According to my brother we are related in some way to as many as 10 of those that came on the Mayflower.  We are direct descendants of at least 4.  From that part of my family tree I have the following related to me:

Myles Standish  -- 10^th Great Grandfather                

John Alden  -- 10^th Great Grandfather

William Brewster  --  11^th Great Grandfather

John Adams  -- 3^rd Cousin, 8^th Removed

Henry Wadsworth LongFellow  --  4^th Cousin, 5^th Removed

John Quincy Adams  -- 4^th Cousin, 7^th Removed

William Cullen Bryant  -- 5^th Cousin, 6^th Removed

Ulysses S. Grant  --  6^th Cousin, 6^th Removed

Franklin Delano Roosevelt  --  7^th Cousin, 5^th Removed

Edited May 13, 2015 by Tom Wetmore

[Gail]

Abraham Lincoln, through his mother Nancy Hanks

[Tom Wetmore]

Another notable artist in the family tree...  Stanley Gordon ("Gordon") Wetmore (1938-2011) a renown portrait artist with many notable achievements and honors in the art community. He was a 9th cousin.  From his obituary: 

"During his lifetime, Wetmore created over 800 portraits of many distinguished and well-known subjects including President Richard M. Nixon, Jack Nicklaus, Fred Couples, Dr. and Mrs. Norman Vincent Peale, Leon Uris, Princess Grace of Monaco, Prince Rainier, Prince Albert, and many others.His works are in the collections of The White House, The Royal Palace of Monaco, Harvard University, Duke University, the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Northwestern University, Presbyterian Hospital, New York, Massachusetts General Hospital, the Harvard Medical Center, and countless other remarkable collections spanning the globe."

Our paths crossed in an odd way, and I corresponded with him a bit. This was many years after I knew of him, having gotten a copy of one of his art books from my mother-in-law long before.  Regrettably I never met him in person even though he graciously invited me to stop by his studio in Chattanooga, TN if I was ever in the area.  Missed the opportunities before he died...  

 

 

 

Edited May 23, 2015 by Tom Wetmore
disappearing pics... and adding degree of cousinhood

[Tom Wetmore]

George Peabody Wetmore (1846-1921) was the 37th governor of Rhode Island, serving for 2 terms, and a US Senator for the state of Rhode Island from 1895-1913. He is my 5th cousin, 4th removed.  Here is the wiki link to more about him - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_P._Wetmore .

 

This is his home, the Chateau Sur Mer, in Newport, RI that was built by his father in 1852. His father, William Shepard Wetmore, was a Merchant in the China trade.  The house is a historic landmark and is now a museum.  The wiki link - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chateau-sur-Mer .

 

Edited May 15, 2015 by Tom Wetmore

[Johann]

Well, one of my ancestors was Olafr Tryggvaason, king of Norway 995-1000. He "preached" Christianity to the nordic vikings and he influenced Iceland to rejct paganism and accept the Christian faith at the assembly of the Althing the year he died, 1000 AD. Some of the chief farmers thought the water in the large lake where most of them were baptized was too cold, so they took baptism in one of two warm pools  they passed on their way home from the assembly. One of these is at Laugarvatn, only about 30 minutes from our home. We usualky take our foreign visitors to the place so  they can see how baptism took place a 1000 years after Jesus was on earth.

[phkrause]

Well, one of my ancestors was Olafr Tryggvaason, king of Norway 995-1000. He "preached" Christianity to the nordic vikings and he influenced Iceland to rejct paganism and accept the Christian faith at the assembly of the Althing the year he died, 1000 AD. Some of the chief farmers thought the water in the large lake where most of them were baptized was too cold, so they took baptism in one of two warm pools  they passed on their way home from the assembly. One of these is at Laugarvatn, only about 30 minutes from our home. We usualky take our foreign visitors to the place so  they can see how baptism took place a 1000 years after Jesus was on earth.

 

​  pun intended!

[Tom Wetmore]

These birds are two of the birds named after Alexander Wetmore.  The scientific name  of the first one is Wetmorethraupis sterrhopteron.  Its common name is Orange-throated Tanager. Discovered in the 1960's it is found only in the border region between Peru and Ecuador.  The second is a Masked Mountain Tanager with the scientific name Buthraupis wetmorei.  It is a rare bird found only at high elevations on the Eastern slopes of the Andes.

[Tom Wetmore]

And from Google Earth a couple screen shots of the Wetmore Glacier in Antarctica.  The second picture gives a perspective relative to the southern tip of South America. 

 

     

Edited May 25, 2015 by Tom Wetmore
disappearing pic...

[Jeannieb43]

Well, none of my relatives has ever had a glacier named for him, but....

My great-uncle was Professor Frederick Griggs.   He was an Adventist college president (AUC and later EMC/Andrews), and board chairman of College of Medical Evangelists (now Loma Linda University School of Medicine).   Griggs Hall on the LLU campus is named for him.  There's also a Griggs Hall at Andrews University, I believe.   He was the brother of my maternal grandmother.  He used to put us children on his knee and sing to us:  "There's something tapping on the maple tree -- tap, tippy tap, tap, tap; but there's nothing around that I can see, save a lark that is singing a song of glee, and it isn't he..... who is tapping along so merrily, tap, tippy tap tap tap." 

He had a pleasant tenor singing voice (his sister, my grandmother, used to sing solos in church; so they both had musical genes). 

 

It's amazing to me that I can still remember those words -- from more than 70 years ago.  (--And I've already forgotten what I did yesterday.)

 

Can't wait to get to heaven, to see some of these long-gone leaders of our families and our church.

[Nan]

The other side of the coin.....My paternal grandfather's mother was a Morley.   My grandfather would never speak of his forebears

and we wondered if it was modesty as there apparently is a Lord Morley of British origin.  Years later some research showed that

Sarah Morley was the daughter of Thomas Morley and his wife Elizabeth nee Tavender....both of whom were transported as convicts

to Tasmania from England in the first half of the nineteenth century !   Of course to the perverted Australian mentality having some

convict ancestors establishes your identity in this country !

PS the crimes committed were for him, stealing a silk handkerchief, and for her, stealing some cloth and gold coins. 

[Tom Wetmore]

Noteworthy Canadian Wetmores in the family tree...

Andrew Rainsford Wetmore (1820-1892) would be my 5th cousin 4th removed.  He was the 1st Premier of the province of New Brunswick Canada from 1867-1870 and later a member of the New Brunswick Supreme Court. He was a member of a prominent United Empire Loyalist family, which were those British loyalists that resettled in Canadian territory during or after the American Revolution.  It appears that Andrew Rainsford Wetmore's grandfather, Thomas Wetmore (1767-1828), my third cousin, 6th removed, and great grandfather, Timothy Wetmore, my second cousin, 7th removed, were his ancestors that resettled in Canadian territory in 1783 after the American Revolution.  They were all lawyers. Thomas served as Attorney General in New Brunswick for 19 years. His son and Andrew's father, George Ludlow Wetmore, was also a lawyer that had the dubious distinction to have died in a duel with opposing counsel in 1821 when Andrew was just an infant.  Timothy eventually returned to the United States and died in New York. 

[Tom Wetmore]

Another prominent Canadian Wetmore was Edward Ludlow Wetmore (1841-1922) (my 5th cousin, 4th removed), Andrew Rainsford Wetmore's first cousin,.  Edward Wetmore was also a lawyer, politician and judge.  He was mayor of Fredericton, New Brunswick and New Brunswick legislator.  His father, also a lawyer, was Charles P Wetmore, the brother of George Ludlow Wetmore that died in a duel.

From Wikipedia entry on Edward Ludlow Wetmore-

In 1887, he was appointed puisne judge of the first Supreme Court of the Northwest Territories and in 1907 he was appointed the first Chief Justice of Saskatchewan. He served in this position until 1912.

In 1907, he became the first Chancellor of the University of Saskatchewan and served in this position until 1917.

[Tom Wetmore]

Thumbing through The George Washington University (my alma mater) alumni magazine I noticed this note about Frank Alexander Wetmore - http://magazine.gwu.edu/one-birds .