Contents

Foreword

         Early in 1976, our country's 200th year, I decided to gather information to fill in the "family-tree" scrolls which our son, John, had given us at least three years ago.  The additional facts and stories that a chart cannot show were so interesting, it seemed worthwhile to record them to accompany the scrolls.

Ideas came from:
Source

1. - my husband, Bill, 59
2. - his cousin Margaret Nelle, 72, of Gowanda, NY.
3. - my Aunt Min Dreher, 80, of Buffalo
4. - my Uncle Russell Williams, 79, of Stanhope.
5. - my second cousin Doris Hill Van Auken, about 40, of Stanhope.
6. - Mother's cousin Raymond Hill, 82, of Augusta, NJ and his granddaughter, 30, Debbie Flynn. Stokes Forest (whose husband is helping her trace the "Hills of Sussex Co." back as far as her great-great-great grandparents).
7. - Mother's cousin, May Cressman, 69, of Hope.
8. - My brother, Charles Leavy, 57, of Stanhope.

Both sides of my mother's family originated in Swartswood and most were farmers.    I will start with them because I am still excited about my recent visits to several of their homes.

Generation (A).

Susan and Michael Hill (1810 - 1887)

My grandmother's grandparents had 10 children:
(All were born and schooled in Swartswood, grades 1 - 8 only being provided, as was common then.)

Generation (B).

1. George - 1838-1915 - lived mostly in Swartswood, NJ.
2. Robert ------------- lived mostly in Hope, NJ.
3. Jacob -------------- lived mostly in Delaware Station, NJ.
4. John --------------- lived mostly in Standing Stone, PA.
5. Obadiah ------------ lived mostly in Buttzville, NJ.
6. Richard - 1850-1937 - lived mostly in Libertyville, NJ.
7. Mary - Married George Fox and lived in Great Lakes, PA.
8. Caroline ----------- lived in Blairstown, NJ.
9. Hester Married Henry Mitten and lived in Hackettstown, NJ.
10.Matilda Married John Layton and lived in Middleville, NJ.

B   l. George Hill married Elizabeth Harris (1835 - 1906) on September 7, 1861.  They had 10 children:

Generation (C).

1. Harris Hill
2. Eli - Newark, NJ. : California.
3. Edward 1866 - 1916 - Swartswood, NJ.
4. Naomi 1868 - 1958 (My Grandmother) Johnsonburg: Stanhope, NJ.
5. Emma - Johnsonburg.
6. Effie 1873 - 1896 (aged 23).
7. Harvey - Newton, NJ.
8. Obadiah, Oct. 14, 1863 - 1948 - Augusta, NJ.
9. L. May 1877 - 1885 (aged 8).
10. Elmer - Oct. 18, 1879 - Mar. 21, 1938 - Swartswood, NJ.

1 -      Harris Hill went "West" to homestead and was never heard of again.

2 -      Eli married Sally.  For 40 years, he operated a trolley car in Newark, from the age when trolleys were horsedrawn, to the electric powered era.  He was ambitious and thrifty to the verge of miserliness, but so wise an investor that he held a seat on the New York Stock Exchange.  He owned a two family house in Newark and was considered wealthy.  He retired to California where he bought land and apartments.  When his wife died, he married her cousin.  A few years later, Eli died.  His wife and her daughter retained his fortune, shipping his body East for burial in a little cemetery near Johnsonsburg, with scarcely enough money to cover expenses. (Sources 4 & 6).

3 -      Edward Hill (1866 - 1916) married Margaret (1868 - 1942).  He bought and ran a hotel in Swartswood.  He tended the bar himself and died at fifty of alcoholism.  They had one daughter, May Hill Sevey, now in her nineties -  in 1981.

4 -      Naomi and Emma, the only girls who lived beyond 23, married, farmed, and lived to a ripe old age.  They had the Hill traits of strength, vigor, and self-reliance, but were sharp of tongue and domineering.  They caused many unhappy times for their children, spouses, and grandchildren, including me. (Naomi married Charles Williams. Mother, Viola, was their first child).

5 -      Emma married Fred Garris.  They farmed in Swartswood.  Floyd was their son.

7 -      Harvey Hill clerked in a grocery store most of his life, 24 years in a Newton store alone.  He married Dora Ackerson, considered a beauty.  They had one son, Harold, who still repairs auto and truck radiators in Newton.  I remember Harvey as tall, slender, kind and rather deaf.  He enjoyed his grandchildren: Loretta who now lives in Amsterdam, NY and Doris Hill Van Auken of Stanhope who has 8 children.  One day when I first met Doris I figured out our relationship:

Grandma Naomi Hill Williams - Sister of - Harvey Hill

Her Daughter

Viola Williams Leavy - first cousin of - Harold Hill, Harvey' son.

Viola's Daughter

Olive Leavy Davenport - second cousin of - Doris Hill Van Auken, Harold's Daughter.

         In Grandma's sibling, perhaps the most successful farming was done by Obadiah Hill's family at "Winding Brook Farm," Augusta.  Obadiah's son, Raymond, carried on the operation until he retired 15 years ago.  His sons Jack and Howard are dairying there successfully with very modern equipment.
         Obadiah's other son, George, had a fine farm on the Newton - Sparta road.  His third wife (of a year),
received all his wealth on his demise a few years ago.

                  Obadiah Hill of Augusta had two sons.

Generation (D).

1. George Clark Hill    (no children)
2. Raymond - 1895   -  married Martha Sherred of Myrtle Grove, Hampton Twp. in 1919.

Generation (E).

1 - Robert 1925     2 - Janet 1927      3 - Howard - 1928
4 - Marge 1929      5 - Ralph 1930     6 - Jack - 1939

         I once met one of Irving's three sons, Walter Hill, a Newton lawyer.  There is also Gene of Pennington and Edwin.

         While George Hill was raising his 10 children in Swartswood, the Williams family also lived there, close to the one-room school.  One winter night Alverta Williams, the oldest, went skating on the pond with the lady schoolteacher. They hit a thin patch of ice and went through.  Allie's father rushed to the rescue, placing a ladder flat on the ice to crawl out in time to save her.  The school teacher died although he found her and pulled her out.

         Mr. Williams was so wet and chilled from the experience that he developed tuberculosis which took his life when his son Charles was nine and Ed was 7. Five years later, the mother died.  Allie was very capable, although she was only about 16.  She took charge of the home and her brothers were ever-afterward grateful for the way she raised them.  They completed their education at the Swartswood school.  As there was no high school, algebra, geometry and other advanced subjects were taught in the eighth grade.

         When Allie married Tom Robbins, she moved to a farm near Johnsonburg, she took her brothers with her.  And they apparently stayed until they married.  Allie and Tom had a son, Ed Robbins who grew up to run the same farm. We dearly loved Ed, Mother's cousin and often visited him and his wife, Julia.  Even Bill enjoyed going to see them and ski on the slopes now cut by Route 80, where you can see the farmhouse and barn, (still in use).

         Mother and Daddy also took us on our regular Sunday afternoon rides, to visit Uncle Ed Williams, and Aunt Francis and their daughter, May, in two locations in Johnsonburg.  Ed (1871 - 1944) worked rented farms.  In his later years, he guarded the "cut" for the D. L. and W. Railroad - checking for fallen rocks every half hour, in that man-made canyon.

         Ed's daughter May, Mrs. Norman Crissman, still lives on a fine farm at Hope.  We're close friends of May and Norman's, today, and happy to see them living comfortably in retirement after a hard lifetime of farming.

         The Williams were so pleasant in nature, we enjoyed visiting all of them, often.  They lived good and useful lives.

My Grandparents:

         Charles Williams (1870 - 1934) married Naomi Hill (1868 - 1958).  They bought a 36 acre farm that had 8 acres of "muck", 2 & 1/2  miles beyond Johnsonburg toward Hope.  He raised wonderful crops of vegetables on the muck which was a black, rich top-soil deposited at the bottom of a glacial lake about 10,000 years ago.  Great Meadow rich black earth had the same origin.  Grandpa claimed the "muck" was all top-soil, forty-feet deep, free of rocks.
         Charles and Naomi lived in a log cabin until they could move into their new home built behind the old cabin, which was then demolished, when Russell, their third child was 6 months old.  Their children were:

Generation (D)

1 - (My mother) Viola Rachel Williams
    September 15, 1890 - April 14, 1960
    married Harry Henry Leavy Sept. 11, 1912.
2 - Olive E. Williams - January 5, 1894 - December 17, 1973
    married Wm.  B. Lance ( 1991 - 1954)
    married George Saxman (Fla.)
3 - Russell Williams - June 28, 1898 who took good care of each wife to the end of her days!
    Loie Best (1895-1936)
    Mattie McNeel Goucher (1891-1953)
    Hazel McNeel Burdette (1895-1980)

         In his fifties, Grandpa was pretty well worn out and he retired.  He built a house here in Stanhope, where all his children lived.  He was fond of us three, his only grandchildren, and would walk uptown almost daily to see us. He was slow-moving and easy going.  He often stayed so long, the "Old Lady" (Grandma) came up bristling and jawed him to get home to tend the garden or milk the goat.

         Viola had a keen mind and a strong inner drive.  She was the first to attend high school although she had to walk 7 miles to Newton, board by the week, and walk home.  She passed her "teachers' exams" when she finished eighth grade but the school board said she was too young to teach.  After 4 years in Newton High School, she taught all 8 grades, in a one room school in Stillwater.  There she taught the mother of Ruth and Olive McConnell who run the Netcong 5 & 10.

         Harry H. Leavy lived in the same boarding house in Newton while he was an apprentice plumber, roofer, and tinsmith to Charlie Watkins.  One evening, on the porch, Harry offered to share his bag of peanuts with Viola.  A few years later, September 11, 1912, they were married, on the lawn of her home near Johnsonburg.  I still have the clipping about their wedding, in a scrapbook about our early days.

         Mother and Daddy were a fine couple!  They were on the shy side and seldom spoke of their early personal lives, but I know from living with them that they had a genuine love and a rare, true harmony, and were guided by a genuine religion, a blend of Methodism and a little early Hebrew training.

         Charlie Watkins and his partner Jake Humphrey decided to open a branch of their plumbing business in Stanhope. This act led our family to this area because they put Harry Leavy in charge.  Harry and Viola rented a house on King Street, adjacent to the one where Dicky Leavy lives now.  There all three of us were born. (Dicky's son Ryan was born there last Christmas 175, so the next generation (F) of Leavy's to carry on the name is starting on the same street.

Generation (D).

Viola R. Williams   Married on Sept. 11, 1912     Harry H. Leavy
(Sept. 15, 1890 - Apr. 14, 1960)                  (Feb. 12, 1891 - June 19, 1951)

Generation (E).

1 - Olive Mae Leavy - born Feb. 14, 1915
    Married William Davenport July 12, 1941
    Children:

Generation (F).

John Harry Davenport July 19, 1942
Charles Robert Davenport Jan. 12, 1948

2 - Evelyn Naomi Leavy - born Aug. 15, 1917
    Married Francis E. Lee on March 13, 1943
    (Born Aug. 22, 1917)

3 - Charles Joseph Leavy - born Jan. 1, 1920
    Married Mima Trappe, Nov. 15, 1919
    Children:

Generation (F):

Carol Jean Leavy - July 11, 1943
Sandra Lee - Oct. 28, 1945
Barbara - Oct. 28, 1945
Richard Charles - Nov. 2, 1947
Michael Alan - Aug. 11, 1948

         Daddy bought the business from Watkins and Humphrey and the house on upper Main Street where we moved when I was five.  He erected a garage and store - shop, eventually attaching these to the house by putting on office between.  There was so much store business while Daddy was out on the job, that Mother's housework was constantly interrupted to tend store, selling stove pipe, stove repairs, wicks for oil lamps and stoves, leathers for pitcher pumps, fire brick, water pails, paint and the likes.  Mother and Daddy both worked hard but with a heart.  Unable to force people to pay up, there were over $10,000 in accounts receivable owed Daddy when he died in 1951.

         Mother and Daddy were a great asset to the community.  They worked ardently for the Methodist Church, attending regularly, morning and evening, teaching Sunday School, helping with Epworth League.  Daddy had a fine bass voice and sang in the choir for 30 years.  Daddy was honored at a dinner in 1948 and given an Americanism award for service to the community, 20 years as firechief, nearly 28 years on the town council.  While Daddy was at meetings or choir practice, Mother spent many evenings alone.  She never complained.  She read, listened to the radio (we had one of the first crystal sets in Stanhope) or mended, warming her toes, in winter, on the plate in front of the open oven door of the coal - oil kitchen range.

         They were good parents.  Without any special demonstration, we knew we were loved equally, treated fairly, and well disciplined and cared for.  Mother and Daddy never liked the water, but encouraged us to swim - and we did - so much as five hours a day in Lake Musconetcong, when work was done.  We skated, too.

         As far as I know, I was the first privileged to go to college (Trenton State 1933-37).  Ev got her B.S. there, too, majoring in physical education, I, in math and science, but Charlie was mechanically inclined and after 3 years at Alabama, preferred to work with his hands.  Charlie and Bill have been carrying on Daddy's Plumbing and Heating Business since they returned from World War II.  Ev taught nearly 30 years and I had 20, off and on, in the middle grades 4, 5, and 6 in Mt.  Olive (Flauders and Budd Lake).

         Joe's first wife was Ernestine Cohen (or Cohn).  She bore him 10 children and died when Mark, the last one, was born.  Each child was born in a different city in New York state.  My dad, Harry, claimed Binghamton as his birthplace. Only four lived to adulthood: Phillip, Harry, Alexander, and Albert Benjamin (who married Aunt Min).  Times were hard and the children had serious diseases.  My Dad had typhoid and a weak stomach, but he was strong, quick - moving, very intelligent and made the most of his 6 years of schooling.  His early years were very hard.  He deserved the good homelife he and mother cooperated for and achieved!

         At 14, Mark tripped over a rope some boys had stretched across the sidewalk as he hurried home from work in the dark.  He died that night of the head injury.  This was on Staten Island where Harry had just been fired from a factory for making the pretzels too large.

         Joe's second wife, Louise, was from Syracuse NY.  She solved the economic problems by manufacturing ladies dustcaps, and shipping each boy out on his own as he entered the teens, as was the custom.  Eventually, Uncle Phil ran a hardware store.  Uncle Al always cut ladies dress patterns, and Uncle Ben was a lay-out man for Curtis Airplanes.

         Grandpa Joe was very versatile. -We know he was a peddler selling from a country store in Hainesville, NJ. to rural farm homes, he manufactured flags in Cincinnati, Ohio, and had a theater in Cleveland, and an ice-cream parlor in Cedar - Run, NJ.

         He lived with us the last 5 + years of his life, sick and grouchy, dampening our young spirits, but he did teach us to swim.  Mother treated him just great!

John (?) Davenport 1857-1884 married Laura Rippen Porcher 1845-1924.
    Children: Harry and Grace (Donaldson - Nov. 14, 1876 - July 3, 1958).
George Leonard 1836-1880 married Amelia Elizabeth Flint 1861-1934.
    Daughter: Lydia (1881-1952)

Generation (D)

Harry Davenport (1875-1960) married Lydia Leonard on Oct 12, 1912.
    Sons:  Theodore  Jan. 20, 1914 - March 14,1989  (75 years)
        Robert  Nov. 8, 1915 - Sept. 5, 1970 (54 years)
        William  May 17, 1917 - March 30, 1991 (73 years)

Generation (E)

Theodore Davenport married Charlotte Paul  July 13,1940
Robert Davenport married Lou Vada Erwin
William Davenport married Olive Mae Leavy  July 12, 1941

Generation (F)

Theodore and Charlotte's Children:
    Katherine Key Davenport - Oct. 30, 1942
    Paul - Dec 24, 1946
    Jane Lydia - Oct 4, 1949
    Elizabeth Seymour - Dec 8, 1956

Robert and Lou Vada's Children: (Lou Vada died 1974)
    William Harry
    David - died an infant
    Thomas

William and Olive's Children:
    John Harry - July 19, 1942
    Charles Robert - Jan. 12, 1948

         Laura Rippen Porcher's parents, originally from the island of Martinique and probably French, were living in South Carolina, prior to the outbreak of the Civil War.  Her father, a lawyer or accountant, handled the finances of some wealthy, elderly people, who had securities and investments in the North.  He used a close and trusted friend, a hunchback, who was a gambling steward on passenger ships, plying between the North and the South, to transport funds for his employers.  Mr. Porcher was a loyal Southerner who believed the South could not win.  Fearing for his daughters' safety as war approached, he shipped teen-aged Laura north, with the gambling steward.  Laura, whose mother had died so young she never knew her, was raised by her aunt in New York.  She never saw her father again!

         Later, Laura Porcher married John (?) Davenport, much younger than she.  No one recalls his occupation but he was spoken of as having snappy black eyes and loving to dance.  He developed consumption and went west seeking a better climate, but he died of the tuberculosis and was buried in Denver.

         Laura Porcher Davenport supported her children, Harry and Grace, in her own home in Brooklyn.  There she had a dressmaking shop and eventually she employed 6 - 8 women.  Harry and Grace spoke of having to arise early in order to have breakfast dishes finished and the house clear for the arrival of the seamstresses at 8 a. m.

         Laura was thrifty and hard working as well as a good business woman.  As a sideline, she loaned money to the wealthy patrons who had overspent the budgets set by their husbands.

         Laura was a strong, determined, self-reliant mother who raised her children, Harry and Grace, to be the same and avid readers, as well!

         Laura was enthusiastic about the theater and took the children to see plays, including Shakespeare.  Grace's daughter Margaret was exposed to a great deal of theater and became a professional ballerina, marrying her dance teacher, Anthony Nelle'

         In High School, H learned Pitman shorthand.
         In 1900, at age 25, Harry took a job with the Mutual Life Insurance Company, now M.O.N.Y. He stayed with that company 40 years!  Starting as a junior clear, filling ink wells and opening a big safe every morning to take out all applications to be processed that day and returned to the safe at night, he advanced steadily and gradually to his final position of supervisor of risks.

         Harry got a college degree by taking night courses at N.Y.U. School of Commerce, Accounting, and Finance from 1900 to 1908.  He was a top runner on the N.Y.U. track team.  He arose early, ran across the Brooklyn Bridge and back, showered, dressed in a full suit, including celluloid collar, rode the trolley downtown to 34 Nassau Street, Manhattan, worked 9 - 5 p.m., ate a light supper, took the trolley to N.Y.U. for 7 to 10 p.m. classes, returned to Brooklyn, did his homework, and went to bed late!  Such vitality and ambition!
 

         The Flint family originated in Liverpool, England.  Lydia's grandfather Flint was a sash and door maker in Boston.  His daughter, Amelia Flint married George Leonard, a dockworker.  Just before Lydia was born, her father, George died of appendicitis.

         Amelia Flint Leonard never married again.  She supported herself and Lydia by cooking in a mission.  They must have lived near Grandfather Flint for at age 7, Lydia was almost lost in the Blizzard of '88 when she went out to see where her Grandfather was shoveling snow.

         Amelia and Lydia moved to New York City after Grandpa Flint died.  On the trip (by boat? wagon? train?) his carpentry tools, which Amelia prized, were lost.  Bill presumes his grandmother continued to cook in New York City.

         It is hard to believe that Lydia's formal education ended with the eight grade in Boston, where she had two years of algebra.  She was so well-read, so well-informed on any subject that I assumed for years that she also had attended college. She had a beautiful refinement and quite confidence that supported my supposition.  Such dignity at all times!

         Bill doesn't know the events in his Mother's life from age 14 to 22.  About 1902, Lydia took a job and stayed with the Mutual Life Insurance Company for ten years.

         In these ten years, Lydia supported her mother.  In her work as file clerk, Lydia dealt with the European phase of the business.  She became thoroughly versed in the geography of European countries and all their large cities.

         At the Mutual Life, Lydia met Harry Davenport, and they had much in common.  During their long engagement, she often spent a week-end in summer at the cottage on Lake Hopatcong, near Landing, where his mother and sister (Grace) stayed and from which Harry commuted to work in New York.  At the cottage, Harry raised a cow and some chickens, returning them to the previous owners, the Bangharts, for the winter, (I knew the daughter, Susie Banghart, in her late years).  There, Harry and Lydia decided that when they married it would be good to get out of the city and raise their children on a farm.  From an ad in the paper, they located this farm on Old Waterloo Road out of Stanhope with its 60 acres (of which Harry gave us one when we married in 1941), including 40 fruit trees.  Later, they bought it for about $6,000.

         Being city-bred, Harry and Lydia knew little of country life.  They began at once to read everything available on agriculture, and they never stopped learning and applying.  We have thousands of their well-organized clippings full of information.  Lydia did remarkably well with everything.  She preserved endlessly!  She even canned a cow! (Roasting, stewing, making gravy, etc. first).  All took pride in serving guests canned Betsy!

         "Up in the country", Harry and Lydia not only raised their children but always had her mother, Grandma Leonard, and for her last years, his mother, as well.  The two older ladies were not fond of each other, and with three lively boys in the house, there must have been quite a challenge to keep a happy home.  Today, couples get married quite young and would find this situation hard to handle.  But Lydia and Harry had always had great responsibility and were very mature at the time of their marriage in 1912, she being 31 and he 37, and had supported their mothers for many years.

         A sister to Lydia's mother married a Mr. Graehme, who was a pilot on the ships running between Boston and New York.  They had a large family: Fred, Lucy, Anna, Will, George, Edna, and Eddie.  The mother died fairly young and Anna took over.  Some years later the father died.  It seemed to be a hard-luck family or individuals didn't plan to avoid problems.  Most of them spent some of their troubled times at the Davenport farm, as they were Lydia's cousins.  Anna was invited to stay 6 weeks with her infant son Lenny Allen, when her husband abandoned her.  The two stayed 17 years. They worked hard.  Bill, Bob, and Ted were grown and gone.  Lydia and Harry lived alone only 17 days out of the 40 years.

         The whole family respected and loved and always spoke highly of the two grandmothers who lived with them. Amelia Flint Leonard being the gentler, and Laura Porcher Davenport of a more arrogant nature.

         It would have been almost impossible to make this boulder strewn, swampy,, forested farm pay (at, least it is today, as we are finding out), so Harry Davenport kept his job in New York City and commuted by train.  His health was so good or he was so stubborn, that he only missed work two days, from 1912 (?) to 1941 (50 miles each way). Lydia and the boys did more than their share of the farm work.

         The boys walked 2 miles each way to school until a bus route was set up the last 2 years of Bill's high school years.  Jack Fisher of Waterloo was the driver.  When it was severely cold for walking, the boys padded themselves with newspaper under their clothes.  I remember seeing Mrs. Davenport drive the boys to school, in the pouring rain, with the horse and carriage - on rare occasions.

         It was a wonderful, lively city family that farmed this rough piece of country.  A warm, friendly family, known for its good character and fine contributions to the Waterloo church, Mt.  Olive Township and Budd Lake P. T. A. of which we can be proud.

         I was privileged to come from a family of farmers and plumbers and associated with the Davenports for 35 years and am now helping to hold their land!

                            Olive Davenport
                        Dec. 8 to Dec. 18, 1976

         Re-edited (to be printed) Dec. 5, 1981 at John's insistence, for a Christmas gift to his parents - giving them a new
perspective on a sturdy heritage.

                           Olive L. Davenport

(HTML version typed by Michael Harwood, July 1999)