Meet the Ancestors…. People connected with Darby

[john Haigis]

“Do what you can, with what you have, where you are “ TR Roosevelt 

For review

this is a draft of a piece about people, many of whom are citizens of Eden cemetery, who were important to Pennsylvania, to our nation and to Darby.  I am sending this for review, and to check for accuracy. These are people we hope can be part of "Meet the Ancestors" event at the Darby Library during OcTrolleyFest (Saturday, October 21) and should be better known. Let us 

 know if you would like to take a part and read the description of your person. Acting skills not required. Attire is simple (white blouse and long skirt for women, white shirt with collar turned up with a cravat for men. The goal is fun education.

Annis Boudinot Stockton  (open )born in Darby in 1736 to a French Huguenot family who came to America in the 17th century seeking refuge from persecution. Her father Elias Boudinot (open) was a Founding Father of the United States, a lawyer, statesman, and early  abolitionist and women's rights advocate from Elizabeth, New Jersey. During the Revolutionary War, Boudinot was an intelligence officer and prisoner-of-war commissary under general George Washington, working to improve conditions for prisoners on both the American and British sides. In 1779, he was elected to the Continental Congress and then to its successor, the Congress of the Confederation, serving as President of Congress in 1782—1783, the final years of the war. Annis, his daughter, was an American poet and one of the first women to be published in the Thirteen Colonies. 

John Bartram (Vicken A) was born in Darby in 1699 on land purchased by his grandfather from William Penn which later became Woodburne Mansion and Eden Cemetery. (Daisy story) Bartram was a Member of Darby Friends Meeting, but was disowned (relieved of the obligation to attend Meeting for Business) because of a difference of opinion. As far as we know, he continued to attend worship and is buried in Darby Friends Burial Ground at 12th and Main.

John Blunston (Ryan K) was born in 1644 in Little Hallam in Darbyshire, England and traveled to the new world on the ship Welcome with William Penn, from whom he also purchased 500 Acres in what would become Darby. He served as Speaker of the Pennsylvania Assembly, donated land for the Darby Burial Ground, may have been at the Treaty of Shackamaxan, protested the keeping of slaves in 1715, and may have played a mediators role in the signing of the 1701 chart of privileges.

Ed Bolden (open)worked in the post office and in 1910 started a youth baseball club known as the Darby Hilldales who won the Negro League World Championship in 1925. The team was noted for Fair Play and Clean Dealing and seven of the Hilldales are in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown

Hilda Bolden (open) was Ed Bolton’s daughter, the first African-American valedictorian of Darby, high school, a pediatrician, and a concert pianist. Upon her father’s death, she became the owner of the Philadelphia stars, a noted African-American baseball team.

Martha Scofield (open) was born in Darby, and after the Civil War went to South Carolina to open a school for people recently freed from bondage.

Charles Lloyd (Mr. Kelly) was the proprietor of the Blue Bell Inn on Cobbs Creek, served as a Darby Burgess (councilman) helped a number of slaves on the underground railroad, and is buried in Darby Friends Burial Ground at 12th and Main.

Passmore Williamson and his wife Mercie (Jan and John Haigis) were white abolitionists who worked with William Still in the liberation of Jane Johnson, and her two sons in 1855. Because he would not tell where Jane had been taken, he was thrown into Moyamensing prison for contempt, and remained there for 100 days. He purchased a house in Darby in 1878 and sold the property in 1885 to William Painter who commissioned a house that is now the airplane house at 1016 Main Street designed by Minerva Parker Nichols, who was one of the first women architects to be successful in her own firm.

Hugh Breckenridge and Thomas Anshutz and art students (all open) were instructors at the Pennsylvania Academy the Fine Arts, who conducted a summer  art school in Darby 1898-1901 teaching  plein air (outdoor) painting. possibly engendering the phrase “an artist behind every tree.” The art school was located in a barn behind the airplane house, 1016 Main and Anshutz and Breckenridge stayed on the first floor at the Darby Library 

Alan Ricketts (open) was a young man, who escaped from slavery in Maryland at the age of 11 and made his way north and settled in Darby. He was kidnapped back into slavery, and somehow managed to get a letter to the Quakers in Darby explain what had happened. The Quakers of Darby sent someone down to Maryland, where they met with the owner of the slave jail, who agreed to set Alan free if they paid him a substantial sum of money within a week. The Quakers in Darby were able to come up with the money, Alan was redeemed, and he lived in Darby and became known as a magnificent gardener, growing sunflowers that were fully 12 inches across. 

Estelle Ricketts, (open)was the descendent of Alan Ricketts, and was perhaps America’s first female African-American composer. One of her songs is called “Rippling Spring Waltz.”

Thomas Garratt (open) was a member of Darby Friends Meeting before moving to Wilmington and served with William Still and Passmore Williamson  on the Vigilant Committee. He was a noted abolitionist, working with Harriet, Tubman, and others on the Underground Railroad. Bankrupt by the court because of his illegal anti-slavery activities, he nevertheless told the Court, “Thou has left me without a dollar… I say to thee and to all in this courtroom, if anyone knows a fugitive that wants shelter, sent him to Thomas Garrett, and he will befriend him.“

John Mott Drew (Al R) for whom John Drew Park is named, was an African-American businessman who in 1917 started a jitney service so that domestic workers could get to their jobs in Lansdowne. In the 1930s he’s sold the bus line to red Aronimink on the condition that his worker still had their jobs during the depression. He then bought the Darby Hilldales, and we named the team the Darby Daisies. The story is told that they were called the daisies because they were daisies growing in the field, I know what no matter how badly trampled they were, they sprang up again.

Fred Trent (open) lived in Darby, walked everywhere, and lived for more than 100 years.

William Still, (Joe B) buried at Eden Cemetery, served with Passmore Williamson and Thomas Garratt on the Vigilant Committee to help escaping slaves including Jane Johnson and her two sons in 1855. His book The Underground Railroad published in 1872, is a classic source of historical information.

Caroline LeCount (open)was an educator and advocate for human dignity when she, predating Rosa Parks by nearly a century when she refused to give up her seat on a street car. She sued the Commonwealth and won. 

Octavius Valentine Catto Juwan W) taught Greek, and Latin at what became Cheney State university, raised a regiment during the Civil War, played second base for and was a founder of the Pythians baseball team, named for the story of Damon and Pythias. He was engaged to be married to Caroline LeCount, and was assassinated in 1871 during the first election, which African-Americans had the franchise to vote.

Jean Pierre Burr, (Max B) son of vice president Aaron Burr was a barber, an anti-slavery advocate, taught elocution to young African American men,  signed the call to arms encouraging people of color to fight for their own freedom, and is buried at Eden cemetery. 

Marian Anderson (Pam A) was an opera singer who transformed an act of petty racism (being refused permission to sing in a concert hall because of her color) with the help of Eleanor Roosevelt and others, was able to sing before a worldwide audience of millions.

Matthew Baird (open) was an Irish Immigrant who came at the age of three, and eventually became chairman of the board of Baldwin Locomotive. He built a magnificent summer house in Darby, which later became the site of Hilldale Park, home to the world champion Darby Hilldales.

Frances Ellen Watkins Harper (open)was an educator, poet, and advocate for human dignity, who made a speech before a national women’s convention and said that there would come a day when people would be judged not by the curl, their hair, but by their character, pre-dating Martin Luther King‘s  famous ”I Have a Dream” speech, by nearly a century.

Julian Abele (open)was the first black graduate of the University of Pennsylvania school of architecture and was the foreman of architect Horace Trumbauer‘s firm, who would walk six blocks to work, not wishing to endure the indignity of having to ride in the back of the street car. His accomplishments include the Philadelphia, Museum of Art, the free library of Philadelphia, and Duke University, with possible participation in Trumbauers Woodburne Mansion)

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