History has been brutally unkind to Bernard Kock, my third great-grandfather. Historians use all sorts of pejoratives to describe him — swindler, scoundrel, opportunist — and perhaps with good reason. But at least some of the hostility toward Kock is rooted in the fact that he made Abraham Lincoln look like a hypocrite. Kock convinced […]
The Colonel’s Large Specimens Steal the Show at the American Museum of Natural History
There are no signs to identify the donor of the minerals and ornamental rock carvings left to the American Museum of National History by William Boyce Thompson. Which is too bad, because the Colonel’s collection dominates the cave-like mineral room in the New York museum. He would steal the show. That much was clear when […]
Francis Libby Rowed George Washington Across the Hudson–for Booze
Here’s a story that Francis Libby probably repeatedly told his children. While a soldier in the Revolutionary War, he rowed General George Washington across the Hudson River and back. He received a drink of liquor for his service. Francis Libby, whose grandfather, John Libby, came to America in 1637, wasn’t very old when he partook […]
John Libby Lost His Homes and Two Children in King Phillip’s War
I may have been deep asleep when my teacher covered King Phillip’s War, which played out in New England from 1675 to 1676. But this fact would have raised me from my stupor: One of my very distant relatives, John Libby (1603-1685), lost his house and two sons in the fighting. If you are like […]
Margaret Maguire’s Parents Hated That She Married a Tailor
Though we know very little about the life of my third great grandmother Margaret Maguire (1794-1880), this much has been passed down: Her parents were pretty pissed when she took a tailor, John Robinson, for a first husband in Belfast Northern Ireland. Tailoring may seem like a pretty noble occupation today. But Maguire’s father, a […]
Vigilantes Turned to Ace Carpenter William Thompson for Quick and Dirty Gallows
The decent, law-abiding citizens of Virginia City, Montana, had had enough. They wanted to send a strong, clear message to Henry Plummer and his road agents who had been robbing and killing the innocent people of this frontier town. With no formal legal system in place, the vigilantes decided to take matters into their own hands. The […]