Trip Plan

My cousin, Marjorie Harshaw Robie, and I are taking a family history trip beginning in a week. The idea is to visit sites where our ancestors lived, in some cases doing a bit of research and meeting cousins of one degree or other. It will take most of 2 weeks. I'll try to post reports on the trips as we go along. (May take hints from her son's Olympics journal.)

From a York history:

CHANCEFORD PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH – This church is located a short distance southeast of the
village of Airville, and its early history was intimately connected with the Slate Ridge
Church, of Peach Bottom Township, the two congregations, being served by the same pastors for
many years.  The exact time of its organization could not be accurately ascertained, through
references are made to it in official records as early as 1760.  The first settlers of this
interesting section were a very worthy class of Scotch-Irish, many of whose descendants are now
members of this church.  The first house of worship was known as “the tent,” which was removed
and a substantial church built.  The present church was built in 1850.  This one is soon to
give place to a new one.

Captain John and the Continental Congress

Granted, Chanceford is not York. And admittedly, I've been too lazy to compose a timeline for the Rippeys. But it's a fact the Continental Congress was in York for 8 months.

Rippey Genealogy--Future Attracttion

Courtesy of Bobbie Ernst, I have a copy of what I call the "Rippey Generalogy", though technically it's "Genealogy Tables of Some Rippey Families in the United States". W.H. Rippey built it based on foundations done by John Newton Rippey. I'm trying to retranscribe it, so it can be shared on the Internet.

As a note, the genealogy essentially ends with Captain John Rippey's birth in 1749. As a result of Jean's researches, it's reasonable to believe we have two more generations, Mathew and Hugh, identified. See the ancestry.com tree and here.

Seneca Township (3) East Southeast

No. 9 Church in the center of this. Rippeys to the east and west off the Lake to Lake road.

Seneca Township (8) Northwest

No relations I can find. Seneca Castle is, however, the most historically significant place in Seneca township if I remember correctly--being the location of an Native-American "castle".

Seneca Township (7) North Northwest

Another Black.

Seneca Township (5) Southwest

There's a C. Black in the upper left corner, but otherwise this isn't of much family interest.

Seneca Township (4) Southeast

This doesn't show Rippeys, but others who married with them. In the upper right is "Black Hill", which may be the home of Elizabeth Black, my great grandmother (and the home to which she returned after the death of Rev. John Rippey, along with her unmarried brothers and sisters). Maybe.

There's also Crosiers, Robsons, Goundrys, and McIntyres (the last in the lower left corner).

Seneca Township (6) West Southeast

Bingo!!

This is the most important one for Rippey's. In the top right corner you'll see one Rippey, and in the area under Stanley you'll see A.C.Rippey (Aaron Chamberlain). A W. Black is also in the right corner. If memory serves, and it may not, there was a Robson-Rippey marriage.

Seneca Township (2) East Northeast

Don't really know how best to designate these. Again, this is not terribly interesting. (You'll note there's a good bit of overlap of images--Mrs. Reed appears on both the 1 and 2.) A Rippey married a Scoon (right center) and a Crosier, lower center. One thing to note in passing is the number of schoolhouses in a small area. Granted they were one-roomers, but with families of 6+ kids, you needed a lot.

Seneca Township, NE corner

Not much of interest to Rippey descendants here. Note there's a Reed in the lower left and there's a W&TSmith Co. in upper right. One Rippey married a Reed (some day I'll insert who) and the Smiths are notorious on this blog. But I've no way of knowing whether there's any relationship between this company and the William Smith in my ancestry.

Stanley, NY

See Seneca Township Introduction for background.

Like the Hall map, this is from the reverse side of the map showing the entire township. Had to scan twice and the scanning cut off the word "Stanley" in the upper left corner. (You may be able to note where I stitched two scans together.)

The "AC Rippey" is Aaron Chamberlain, son of Hamilton, grandson of George Orson and Marjorie Chamberlain.

There are also several McCauleys, who I've not tried to identify.

Hall's Corners

See the Seneca Township Introduction for background.

Of interest for this blog are the Rippeys (G.O. and E.). The Rippey genealogy also has intermarriages with one or more Robsons, Crosiers, and Legerwoods.

Seneca Township and Its Towns--Introduction

Through e-Bay (which I urge everyone to use--you can save a search and be notified anytime something comes up for sale that meets the terms, such as "Rippey"(warning, I own e-Bay stock)) I got a 1905 map of Seneca Township and its towns: Stanley, and Hall's Corners. I'll be scanning the images and putting on the Internet. The map is big, about the size of 6 letter-size pages laid out, so I couldn't get everything in one image. It shows the owners (or maybe occupants) of each house and farm in the township, including a Rippey, McCauley, McIntyre, and Black. The images themselves are now in my Picasa web album, which I haven't used in a year or so. If and when I include the image in a blog post, you can click on the small image to get a full page view.