Category: Narratives

by: Leo Lawton Once upon a long time ago, there was this feller by the name of Richard Lawton, who had been born around 1499. He met up with a little sweetheart of a gal named what’s-her-face Purrier, and they up and got married. I don’t know what her first name was, but I swear to you Richard knew it. […]

Leo Lawton received a letter from Carol Van Cleef asking for any possible information on Peter S. Lawton of New Orleans in the late 1800s. Carol enclosed a photocopy of an old letter written by Peter. The original copy of the letter was very fragile, difficult to read, and one corner of page two was nearly non-existent. Below is a […]

Grandma’s Story I was born in Orange County Indiana, September 16, 1871. Brother Harvey Hobson was 18 months older than me. His birthday was February 22, George Washington’s birthday. Harvey and I walked to school one and one half miles; usually four months of school in the winter. We ate breakfast always by candle or kerosene lamp. I helped with […]

The Lawtons of Summer OaksStacey A. Church Gerald M. Church Alexander Benjamin Lawton was born September 23, 1809, in South Carolina. He was the fifth child of Benjamin Themistocles Dion Lawton and Jane Mosse, one of three Mosse sisters who married three Lawton brothers. When A. B. was one year old his father joined a family migration to Mississippi. When […]

Family RecollectionsGrace Eveline Lawton 1871 – ? I have been told that the Lawtons came from England to Rhode Island settling in Portsmouth in 1638, which is two years after Roger Williams came to Providence, and a year before Newport was settled, if I have not forgotten those details. It is said that there were three brothers, George, Thomas and […]

HomesteadingLeo Lawton Between 1874 and 1876 the Native American Indians of Saskatchewan, Canada ceded away their rights to the land. However, settlement by former Europeans awaited surveying of the land, a homestead policy, and a ready means of access. After great hardships and Herculean efforts the Canadian Pacific Railroad was finally completed in 1885. Most people thought this would bring […]

Author: Leo Lawton In the 800 block of Leadenhall Street in Baltimore resides the oldest woodworking firm in the United States. Founded by Joseph Thomas in 1820, the business was soon named Joseph Thomas and Son with the birth of his son in 1823. It came to be that in the year 1845 an enterprising young worker named John L. […]

Author: Leo Lawton December 1, 2019 I often sit and contemplate things that matter little to others. I suppose we all do from time to time. While thus engaged an old poem/song came to mind. “Beyond The Sunset” This is the first verse as sang by Hank Williams, my all-time favorite Country and Western entertainer. Should you go first and […]

Author: Leo Lawton October 11, 1999 My oldest brother “Bert” born in 1927, left to go to war in July 1944 when he turned seventeen. By then there were nine children in the family. Four more children were born, but others fled the nest so that there were never more than ten living there at one time. We were a […]

By: Leo Lawton Peter Warren was born in Dublin, Ireland in 1703. By 1744 he was in command of a 16 ship squadron of the English Royal Navy. He had become a wealthy man. Using some of that wealth he purchased thousands of acres of land along the Mohawk River in central New York in the colonies in 1738. Peter […]