Friday, February 3, 2012

Random papers of Leon Joel TIFFANY (+ wife Nellie Graham)

In March 2011, I "came into" some family papers that could possibly be of interest to ancestors of Joel Tiffany, or ancestors of his son Leon Joel, Wilder, his daughter Frances Lord (aka Frankie), or son George Steele Tiffany.

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BACKGROUND

My TIFFANY line is:
Humphrey -> Ephraim -> Consider -> Consider -> Consider -> Ephraim -> Joel -> Joel -> Joel -> George Steele -> John Mason -> Joan Frances -> me.


My great great grandparents are Joel Tiffany and Margaret Mason Tiffany.

Joel TIFFANY (son Joel TIFFANY and Hannah WILDER) was born 6 SEP 1811 in Barkhamsted, Litchfield, CT, and died 1 JUL 1893 in Hinsdale, DuPage Co., IL.

Their children:

i. Frances Lord TIFFANY b 5 JAN 1861 Syracuse, NY, d 19 JUL 1953, Independence, Montgomery Co., KS, m. Charles Alexander WILKIN
        ii.       Leon Joel TIFFANY was born 18 AUG 1863 in NY. He married Nellie Graham.
        iii.       Wilder Mason TIFFANY was born 22 OCT 1867 in NY, and died 1921. He married Bertha A. WALLACE (b. 06/24/1869, d. 05/29/1925) 12 FEB 1901.
        iv.       George Steele TIFFANY was born 6 MAY 1872 in IL. He married Helen CARTER 1 APR 1895.

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FOCUS OF THIS POST

iii. Leon Joel Tiffany and wife Nellie Graham Tiffany had a daughter named Josephine.

Josephine Tiffany married Phillip J. Marcotte

Phillip J. Marcotte's dates: 10/13/1892 - 07/24/1966
Josephine T. Marcotte dates: 03/19/1980 - 11/21/1975

(note: Leon Joel Tiffany and Nellie Graham Tiffany, as well as Phillip Marcotte and Josephine Marcotte are buried in Momence Cemetery, Momence IL)

I am NOT doing research on the Macotte family and I have NO additional information about them. Therefore, I do not know whether Phillip J. Marcotte and his wife Josephine T. Marcotte had any children. But if they DID, then Leon Joel Tiffany and Nellie Graham Tiffany would be their grandparents. And therefore, I thought some of these papers might be of particular interest to their family researchers.

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THE "FOUND" PAPERS

From what I have ascertained, Leon Joel Tiffany and Nellie Graham Tiffany had no children other than daughter Josephine.

However, perhaps other Tiffanys descended from Joel's children--Wilder, Frankie, or George Steele--would be interested in these papers I just received.

their origin
The papers came to me through a woman in Illinois whose grandmother discovered them among articles she had purchased in an auction, in the 1980s.

In March 2011, I spotted a "notification" in an Illinois historical society newsletter published in 1987, of this woman having found these TIFFANY papers, hoping some Tiffany ancestor would find her.

Luckily, 24 years later, the woman who published the notice (whose grandmother had found the papers in the 1980s) was still living in the same town and I was able to find a phone number, and she kindly just sent them to me.

There is not an abundance of papers. And the papers are not "profound" nor of earthshaking interest or import, but they're at least something from our family, which is valuable, and pretty wonderful.

I will hold onto the original papers unless I find a more direct Tiffany descendant than I (my mother is a Tiffany). However, I figured I should post here and let people know these papers exist.

Please don't contact me unless you're a direct descendant. As said, they're not momentous and yet it would take time to photocopy and mail them out.

To give you an idea of what's here -- a couple of letters mostly talking about the weather and saying various members of the family are fine, etc, a little poem, a love note to Nellie, some receipts and lists of numbers, a trail map, some notes about business, and some notes taken from Ouija board readings.

Yes, Ouija board readings. As you may know if you're from this line, many of the family from Joel's line on down were Spiritualists. I may see whether a historical society focusing on Spiritualism is interested in copies or the originals of the Ouija board "transcriptions," and mention of the regular Sunday afternoon "readings."

My mother says her grandfather, George Steele Tiffany, may have been the only child of Joel Tiffany who didn't ascribe to the beliefs of Spiritualism. I have no evidence either way, except that clearly Leon Joel Tiffany was into it too.


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NEXT STEPS

Let me know if you'd like to know more, or if you're interested in seeing these papers. Eventually I'll scan them, and make them available to anyone who wants to see them.

***If you have any ideas of the best place to post such papers, where people can see them for free, please let me know***

thanks!