This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list.
Classification: Query
Message Board URL:
http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/an/GRB.2ACI/192.2
Message Board Post:
I'm only remotely related to Ferris Summerbell -- best I can figure, a 3rd cousin, 3
times removed -- but I can provide a few additional tidbits:
- Richard Corwith Summerbell was married about 1941 to Wanda (maiden name unknown). Wanda
married a man named Myers after Richard's death and died in Chico CA in February 2001
at age 80. Her children with Richard are mentioned in her obit (Appeal-Democract,
2/13/2001) as Rae Keel of California and Betty Jo Fitzgerald of Washington (State). The
grandchild "Joe" who appeared in Ferris Summerbell's 1951 obit (Reno Evening
Gazette, 3/7/1951) must have been a mistake for Betty Jo.
- The children of Jean Elizabeth Summerbell and Lt. Martin Norman Erck were reported in
1951 as Randy and Stanley Erck of Colusa CA.
- The children of Margaret Flora Summerbell and Robert Goff were reported in 1951 as
Chris, Bobbie, Ronnie and Jerry Goff of Austin NV.
I don't know any of these people personally, I should add, nor have I ever sought
contact. Their names come from result of my research on Nancy Summerbell, my direct
ancestor and Ferris' great grand-aunt .
I see you also have a nice history of Benjamin Ferris Summerbell and Elizabeth Martin on
website. One small thing: You have BFS's birthplace as "Peekskill, Putnam
County". Peekskill is actually in Westchester County but, more importantly, according
a family history written in 1916 by his son Martyn, BFS and his siblings were born in the
hamlet of Shrub Oak in Yorktown, also in Westchester County. It's where BFS's
father James lived before Peekskill and the home of the paternal grandparents, Nicholas
Summerbell and Jane Wilson. Having said that, it happens that BFS spent most of his
childhood in Peekskill with his maternal grandparents, Joseph Ferris and Lydia Seymour,
who raised him after his father was killed in a mill accident. When he was 16, BFS
accompanied his mother and siblings to New York City, where he worked as a grocer on the
lower East Side before entering the clergy.
Hope some of this is of value in your research.