Volume 5 Issue 3 Fall 1998
“Some 30 million American can validly claim to be descended from the 23 families who lived through the first winter after the Mayflower landed.” This intriguing statement, attributed to Mr. Tweed Roosevelt, can be found in the June/July issue of Civilization, the magazine published by the Library of Congress.
How many persons alive today do you think are descended from the first settlers of Simsbury? A brief survey of A Record and Documentary History of Simsbury by Lucius I. Barber yielded 53 different surnames among the 74 heads of households known to have settled within the ancient town boundaries between 1664 and 1700. Not surprisingly, many of the people from all over the United States who come into this library to research their family history begin by saying, “My ancestors came from Simsbury.”
