RRRIFA July 15
to 18
This
reunion is held every two years and because of my illness in 2011, I was unable
to attend the reunion in Washington, DC in 2011. Previous to that we had attended reunions in
Utica, New York, Warwick, Rhode Island and Fort Wayne, Indiana.
I
wanted to attend this reunion in Newport, Rhode Island, because it gave me
another opportunity to visit Block Island, where the Rathbun family settled about
1654. The original settler was John Rathbun (1639-1702), who married Margaret Acres (1633-aft 1716).
I am descended from his son John
Rathbun Jr. (1655-bef 1723),
who married Anna Dodge. My Rathbun descent then goes down through 6
generations to my great grandmother Mercy
Ann Rathbun (July 13,
1856-April 26, 1930), who
married William Henry Link (July 19, 1850-Feb. 26, 1899).
It
is a long drive to Rhode Island so we headed off on the Sunday heading for a
hotel at Windsor Locks, Connecticut, just above Hartford. We have stayed here several times and it is a reasonable
and nice hotel. There is also a Cracker
Barrel next door and an Italian Restaurant across the road, so food is nearby.
The
next day we needed to be in Newport Rhode Island by late afternoon. Along the way we did some cemetery shunpiking,
which I will talk about in another blog post. This involved cemeteries in the Old Lyme area
at the mouth of the Connecticut River. We
also spent some time locating a monument to Nathaniel Foote in Wethersfield, CT.
Nathaniel was a founder of Wethersfield.
The funny part is that we had no
specific directions to find it and everyone we asked didn’t know anything about
it. However, a caretaker in the Old
Cemetery, talked to us and looked at the picture we had and suggested it might
be located on the Green. He pointed in
the direction of the Green and we found the monument there.
We
also visited Windsor, CT to see the village green and locate the Windsor
Historical Society which I will have to visit some day. Two of my ancestors were founding families of
Windsor. They were Thomas Dibble and
Joseph Loomis. There are two large
monuments on the village green. The
first monument is to Major John Mason a founder of Windsor. The second monument is for the passengers of
the Mary and John who migrated to Windsor about 1635. It is said that Thomas Dibble and Joseph
Loomis were on the ship, but it would seem there are differing views on this.
We
arrived at Newport around 4 p.m., after crossing the Jamestown Bridge to Jamestown
and then the Claiborne Pell Bridge to Newport. After settling into our room we dropped by the
Family Hospitality room to check in, get our name tags and say hello. In the evening there was a welcome buffet in
the dining room of the hotel. Lots of
food and this is when we started meeting my relatives.
After
dinner, the group held their formal reunion meeting which included presenting
awards and recognition certificates to family who contributed to the
association. Previously, I had been
asked to join the family association board. I agreed to this after some thought and the
nomination was accepted at the meeting. They wanted to make it an international
association.
Tuesday
had been set aside for a trolley tour of Newport, but we decided to tour around
on our own. I had visited Newport 20 or
so years ago on business and did not really see much of the city except for one
of the mansions where we had a formal dinner. So with the help of our GPS and local maps we
took off for the first beach area where we found a parking spot. We then walked part of the famous Cliff walk,
which passes behind many of the mansions. We went all the way to one of the more famous
mansion, The Breakers. We then headed
back to our car and went for a walk on the first beach. It was very sandy, and we waded along the
beach. There was lots of reddish seaweed being washed ashore. We found out later that there were little
crawly creatures being washed in as well. Nice walk with lots of sun. We then got back in the car and drove along
the coast to see the second and third beaches. There is lots of sand in this area and I can
see why many people take their vacation there.
Having
had lots of sun we decided to go back downtown and visit the harbour area for
lunch. On our way we drove around the Ocean
Drive and then past more of the mansions. After finding parking, we wandered around for
a while looking for a restaurant and finally decided on the Aquidneck Lobster
Company. The entrance was a bit dumpy
but the restaurant area was on the end of the pier, so we had a good look at
the boats and the harbour. We both had
Lobster salad rolls for lunch with a salad and French fries. This was a tasty and filling meal. We then went for ice cream shakes at Ben and
Jerrys.
By
the time we were done with lunch (Dinner), it was time to head back to the
hotel for my first board meeting. The meeting went well. I volunteered to setup a Facebook page for the
Association.
In
the evening we visited the Hospitality room where we displayed my ancestral fan
chart for all of my fathers and mothers families and chatted with family
members.
Wednesday
was the big day with the activities mapped out for a fast ferry ride from
Newport harbour to Block Island. The
ferry had a top speed of about 25 knots, so the trip took about an hour. We arrived around 10 a.m. and then boarded a
bus which took us to Settler’s Rock located on Sandy Point. The plaque lists the first settlers of Block
Island. After that we had a brief tour
of other areas of the island and then made a stop at Island Cemetery. This is where the Rathbun family association
had erected a monument to the family. Everyone had a good look around and a wreath
was left at the site. We also found the
monument erected for Tristrum Dodge the father of Anna Dodge.
I
think everyone was a bit tired after the trip and the sun and we then headed
back to the Old Harbour where we had lunch on the porch of the National Hotel. A welcome meal, with a daiquiri helped quench
the thirst. We had a long chat with
members of the family.
We
then had several hours to look around while waiting for the return ferry to
Newport. So we looked around the shops,
had some gelato ice cream, walked a bit and spent an hour or so at the Block
Island Historical Society, some of it sitting on the porch in the shade. Keep in mind this trip took place during the
week long heat wave the covered most of New England and the north east of the
US and into Ontario. Everyone was ready
for the ferry back to Newport. The ride
was pleasant and the passenger cabins were air conditioned.
Thursday
was a free day for the reunion so we decided to leave in the morning and head
toward Ridgefield, Connecticut to do some more Cemetery shunpiking. After that we headed back to Windsor Locks to
our hotel. We had arranged to meet an
acquaintance for supper. She does
proofreading for the Journal I edit for the Ottawa Branch OGS and lives in
Connecticut. We had a pleasant meal at
the Italian restaurant across from the hotel and then returned to the hotel
lobby to chat for a bit longer. A very
pleasant evening!Friday was a day to do some family research. We spent the morning at the Connecticut Society of Genealogists in East Hartford. We looked at their ancestor files, some vertical files and a few books. The real treasure trove, however, was the Connecticut Historical Society which we visited in the afternoon. Their collection of family books was very good. We would need several days to look at them. The interesting part was their collection of vertical files. To see them you had to provide the family name and someone would then go into their stacks and pick out the packages associated with the surnames. These were very thick packages. We took a number of photos of pages to review later.
We
had decided that Saturday would be a fun day. We were still at Windsor Locks, Connecticut. We headed south again towards Long Island
Sound to a place called Essex, Connecticut.
Here you will find the Essex Steam Train and Riverboat. We arrived in time to obtain tickets for the
11 a.m. departure. We bought tickets for
the open car as it was so hot. Also
taking place that day was the Circus train and Big Top show.
After
we boarded, the train crew went through their departure routine and we headed
off with bells dining and whistle blasting. It was nice to hear the steam whistle again. We did have a steam train ride in Lancaster, PA
in May. We went about 12 miles along the
tracks and then backed up to an area where we took the Becky Thatcher for a
ride on the Connecticut River. It is a
simulated Mississippi style riverboat. We
probably traveled about another 12 miles upriver and turned around at the East
Haddam swing bridge. Along the way we
had glimpses of Gillette Castle, and a wild life area. This ride was interesting as many of my early New
England ancestors would have traveled this river by boat.
We
spent some time in the gift shop and then stayed to watch the next train leave.
We learned along the way that the steam
engine they use for the trips was constructed in China! Oh well!
That
completed our week away from home, so we headed back to our hotel to pack and
head off for home on Sunday.
