News

       
  23 May 2013 The Sonoma County historian, Jeanne Thurlow Miller, passed away on January 9, 2013. I met Jeanne in 1995 through Dr. John Baker. She had spent many years researching the 1853 Hagans-Cockrill Wagon Train to Sonoma County and the families which had participated in the migration. She had long felt that it was an untold story that had an important significance to the early history of Santa Rosa and surrounding communities. She was also very generous sharing with me all of her notes, extensive research, and long history concerning this story. Certainly this website would have been a much lesser endeavour without her input. She is among the last of the earlier generation of family historians who explored the dusty archives (and even dust bins) of obscure little towns way before the Internet was even thought of. She did it the old fashion way with a pencil and paper, note cards, maps, and the endless needle-in-the-haystack searching of often unreadable records that she had driven miles to gain access to. Despite the unlikely prospect of finding anything about a forgotten trip from a hundred years before her time, she brought these little nuggets of history back out into the light. Certainly such a generation of dedicated researchers recovering what can be so ephemeral and quickly lost with no other reward than the sheer joy of passing it on to someone else who cares, will be greatly missed.  
  25 May 2008 I have moved this site to http://www.wendtroot.com/cockrill. For those who select the old URL, a redirect command will bring them to the new one. This will remain in effect until October 2008 when it will be removed and the old URL will no longer work.  
  1 Jan 2006 Added a great deal of material about the early Beaver family largely concerning the families associated with them in the Massanutten area of Virginia. Much of this material was gathered as a result of my visit to the area in October of 2004.  
  13 Nov 2005 Many thanks to Susan Zeni for sharing her information with us on her quest to save the Spring Hill Cemetery. This cemetery was on land originally donated by James Madison McReynolds and contains several McReynolds family member as well as others important to this website.  
  1 May 2005 Our friend and "cousin," Dr. John Baker, passed away today. Without his family information, research contacts, and his encouragements, this website would not exist in its present form. His further input will be sorely missed.  
  28 Dec 2004 Thanks to Roberta Ballard Medina for sharing several photographs that had been in the collection of her great grandmother, Hattie (Grant) (Ballard) Hayes. This collection not only includes Hattie's immediate family but also her mother and father, her half-sister, Mary Foster with her husband and their children (Stella and Bess, Arthur, and Steve, Bruce and Fred) her half-cousins, Charles McGuire, Burt McGuire, Ida McGuire, Nora Fulkerson, Alice Clara Fulkerson, and the wedding picture of Mollie Leona Fulkerson and William M. Wendt (my great grandparents).  
  16 Dec 2004 Added more material from James Burgess' ANDERSON, COCKRILL, MOFFETT, SMITH & Allied Families of Northern Virginia, Volume 1: Cockrill Families of Northern Virginia in conjunction with material which I obtained in October of 2004, during a visit to the Heflin Moffett Cemetery on Carter's Run, Fauquier County, Virginia.  
  8 Aug 2004 Numerous additions and several changes have been made. From Sharon Ford, a Rien and Bollen family researcher, comes information about the Rien family, early inhabitants of Valley Ford, who married into the Fowler family. The Bloomfield cemetery has been recently renovated with the many toppled stones remounted and repaired. Most of the photographs of Bloomfield gravesites used here on pages for various family members (generally the descendants of Larkin D. Cockrill) have been updated. A table of links to pages about particular locations and various documents found on this site has been added to the Links page as an aid to locate commonly accessed pages. Thanks to Leona Mastan for her photographs of the Henry Hardin Family plot at the Macedonia Cemetery in Sebastopol. From Mike Jones, a Logan Family researcher, comes many details about William Barrett Cockrill's life in Kentucky. And finally, from Mary Costello, comes information about the Irving Nolan McGuire family including several pictures.  
  11 Apr 2004 Consolidated information about the area of Kentucky in which the Cockrills had lived. Also started working on including information extracted from early Kentucky tax records for this area as it pertains to various collateral Cockrill family branches.  
  17 Dec 2003 Many thanks to Elder Robert Webb, Primitive Baptist Church minister, church historian, librarian, and webmaster, for bringing to my attention as well supplying the documentation about the existence of the Primitive Baptist Church in Sonoma County, including material about members from the Cockrill, Beaver, and Hagan families.  
  26 Oct 2003 Added more material to the Claypool family genealogy, including an inventory of a Claypool Cemetery near Bowling Green, KY graciously shared by Denise Kitchens. The parents of Jeremiah Claypool are buried in this cemetery along with several of his brothers and sisters.  
  17 Aug 2003 Launched The William M. Wendt Family of Sonoma County website, the third part of this genealogy.  
  19 Apr 2003 Expanded upon the details of the 1857 William A. Buster embezzlement scandal with transcriptions of news stories of the times taken from the Sonoma County Journal. Of particular interest is a Sheriff's Sale of two Santa Rosa City lots, owned by Buster, James and Mary Case, James E. Crane, and Joseph Browning.  
  31 Mar 2003 Added several new items about Dr. Bruce Cockrill and the Trosper family thanks to Gary Rogers, the webmaster of The Cazadero, California Website.  
  21 Feb 2003 Corrected and added additional information about William Henry Zilhart's family, thanks to Shirley Pope, a Zilhart and Wells family researcher.  
  9 Feb 2003 Added material (thanks to Herbert J. Boothroyd) concerning a Cockrill family history compiled in the 1950's by Charles Morgan Cockrill's daughter, Effie Joy.  
  26 Nov 2002 Included additional material from Bert Wonnacott about the Faneuf Family and Nancy (Beaver) Faneuf/Maddock. Nancy was said to be the oral source of an early Cockrill family history which was reiterated in a number of documents with the general title of, "Information Concerning the Family of Mrs. Jesse Bardin as told to Winifred Readmiller by Nancy Maddock" and circulated in various forms among members of the Bardin, McGuire, and Baker Family lines.  
  17 Oct 2002 Added more material about the Ida May McGuire Family, including genealogies of her husband's family (the Baker and Harvey lines).  
  15 Oct 2002 Corrected and added to early Cockrill and Anderson family history using material extracted from Jim Burgess' book ANDERSON, COCKRILL, MOFFETT, SMITH & Allied Families of Northern Virginia, Volume 1: Cockrill Families of Northern Virginia (Arizona, 2002).  
  25 Sep 2002 Made several corrections and additions to the Hardin and Hopper family lines based largely on information which Kit Fuller, a Hopper and Hardin family researcher has shared with me. Aside from the assumption that the Hardins and Hoppers participated in the 1853 immigration, the connection of these two massive and complex family lines with the Cockrills is somewhat nebulous. Though, there could be a family connection between the Cockrills and the Hoppers through the Davenport line. Key family documents recognizing a connection or knowledge of shared activities between these groups appear to be missing if they indeed ever existed.  
  3 August 2002 Completed transcribing several documents written by William Aaron Cockrill which includes a family history and autobiography. Many thanks to Rebecca Aileen Cockrill for sharing these documents with me.  
  23 July 2002 Added an early Cockrill Family history as told by members of the Bardin family.  
  2 June 2002 Corrected and added material for the Bardin family which was obtained from John McKenzie.  
  26 May 2002 Added additional material about the family of Talitha COOPER obtained from William H. Cooper.  
  31 Mar 2002 Corrected and added material for the McReynolds family obtained from Susan Zeni.  
  10 Mar 2002 Added material for Charles Morgan Cockrill including deed maps for both him and his mother, Ruhana.  
  24 Feb 2002 Added material for the Trosper Family, including Elizabeth Trosper's McGuire Family history letter.  
  5 Feb 2002 Reorganized and included additional material for Oscar Beaver and Evans & Sontag.  
  28 Jan 2002 Completed the addition of several scanned photographs by Cathy Berry of Claypool family pictures from the collection of Carolyn Claypool Thorsen.  
  1 Jan 2002 Finally completed the addition of photos and information concerning the Beaver and Strickler families obtained from Ross Williams last June.  
  28 Nov 2001 Added a significant amount of material about Joseph Venable and his family obtained from the research and good graces of Ellen Venable Poteet.  
  20 Nov 2001 Reorganized Bloomfield material and included several turn-of-the-century photographs courtesy of Rebecca Aileen Cockrill.  
  11 Nov 2001 Have been making numerous changes to the site, as well as corrected format problem with using certain browsers.  
  25 May 2001 Cockrill Website Launched 3:49 PM.  

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This page created on 05/25/01 15:38.