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Ellie’s getting married
My three-greats grandmother, Ellie Stoneroad Patterson, seems to have come from a family of some means. She went to a private school in Harrisburg and spent her twenties unmarried–this was in the mid-1800s–and lived with her mother, traveling a bit, including to Iowa to visit her sister. She married John Lyon Patterson in March 1872, at the age of thirty, and moved from Mifflin County to Juniata County, leaving behind her community, her congregation, and the Sunday School class she taught. This letter, written to Ellie from her Lewistown friend E.K. Gibson in March 1872, was evidently sent after Ellie had moved away to join her new husband J.L. Patterson in Pleasant…
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JL Patterson, farmer
My great great great grandfather, John Lyon Patterson, wife of Ellie Stoneroad, lived on a farm in Pleasant View, Pennsylvania. His stone farmhouse stands today, along present-day Route 75 in Spruce Hill Township, Juniata County, not far at all from where I grew up. My family, or at least many parts of it, hasn’t moved far in well over a century. Grace Patterson Henry, JL’s daughter and my great great grandmother, assembled and saved many items and papers from both her mother’s and father’s families, and she’s the reason I have this amazing collection today. Among the items saved are those pointing to JL’s farming background. I found one of these items…