Published: September 25, 2009 05:50 pm      

Connections: Researching family ties leads to interesting revelations

My mother told me some time ago that her great grandfather had been active in the Whig political party in the 1830s and ’40s, a move that no doubt prompted a political split in the family. Mom’s maiden name was Hodgens and her grandfather, my great-great-grandfather, Isaac Hodgens, had been a personal friend of Andrew Jackson, a strong political supporter and a staunch Democrat from the start of that political party.

In the 1830s, some other family members abandoned their Democratic party roots to join in with the Whigs. That only lasted for a couple of decades when the Whig rhetoric didn’t suit the radical contingent of my ancestors, left the Whigs to join in with the party of Mr. Lincoln. That didn’t last forever, and by 1919 when my mom was born, even her mother had quit canceling out her husband’s vote, and joined the Democratic Party.

I’ve been thinking about modern political parties a lot lately and did some Internet searching on my way to writing this column. My hometown of Claysville, Pa., was established in 1812, and named for the great Kentucky orator, Henry Clay, the man who Wikipedia claims was most responsible for getting the U.S. into the War of 1812 and also, the founder of the Whig Party.

It made sense to me then that people — including some of my ancestors around Claysville — would support the political party Clay established. I didn’t realize until I was tracking down that little bit of information that three of Henry Clay’s cousin’s — children of Mitchell and Phoebe Clay — were killed by Indians in 1783. Mitchell and Phoebe Clay were Mercer County’s first settlers and lived at Clover Bottom near Lake Shawnee.

The Internet has put an incredible amount of information at the fingertips of anyone who cares to search. It is no wonder people can get lost in the parade of information that is available every day, all day long as long as the power company keeps electrons flowing into my outlet. As we all know, electrons come from the planet Electra.

As I was looking for the date of incorporation for my hometown, I found a little bit of trivia that I never knew before.

Our farm was located near the birthplace of William Holmes McGuffey, and the high school I attended was named for him, but he’s not even the Internet’s pick for the town’s most famous resident. That honor belongs to Benjamin Franklin Jones who was born in Claysville on Aug. 8, 1924. Wikipedia lists McGuffey as being born “near” Claysville.

When Benjamin Franklin Jones was 27 years old, he invested some of the earnings he saved from the river barge industry and bought a share of the American Iron Works. Jones later joined with James H. Laughlin, as owners of the American Iron Works and eventually renamed the company they formed, Jones & Laughlin or J&L Steel.

Up until that moment, I had absolutely no idea that the steel mills I loaded out of in Alliquippa, Pa., and delivered to in Indiana and Kentucky were connected to Claysville ... the place where I parked my Freightliner. It wouldn’t have changed anything in my life, but it made me think about all of the times I entered I-70 at Claysville for the first part of my journey to Alliquippa, Pa., and then to the point where the steel was headed.

I had a dog named “Rube” that died trying to cross the interstate there. I hadn’t thought about Rube for a long time. She was a sweetheart. I had left her in the care of a friend who lived in the section of Claysville called “South Pittsburgh.” She got loose somehow, and was probably trying to cross the highway to get back to my family home at 104 Main Street in Claysville. I was gone on a trip and my friend was torn up when he told me what happened. I still feel bad that I didn’t take Rube with me on that trip.

I hauled steel to and from many places during my five years driving tractor-trailer, but I loaded more steel out of J&L’s Alliquippa Plant than any other place. If I would have known Benjamin Franklin Jones was from my home town, I would have tipped my hat in his memory.

Instead, I sang a few verses of Dave Dudley’s “Six Days on the Road,” when I passed my old home town and kept on trucking. When I drove a truck, I was always trying to get somewhere else.

Bill Archer is a senior editor for the Daily Telegraph. Contact him at barcher@bdtonline.com.