The Year 2009 is concluding. Time flies, as those of us immersed in history know well. May 2010 bring all of you hope, happiness, good health and prosperity.
For those who do not own or have access to a printed version of Spencer P. Mead's 'History and genealogy of the Mead family of Fairfield county, Connecticut, eastern New York, western Vermont, and western Pennsylvania from A.D. 1180 to 1900 (1901)' it is possible to go to the Internet Archive and find online and scanned editions there. Go to this link. Visitors have a number of choices including downloading a pdf file and reading the text online. Enjoy!
One of these is identified in Spencer P. Mead’s Abstract of Greenwich Tombstones published in 1913 as the ‘Mead Plot on Byram Shore.’
Dated March, 1908 its location is given as “Near the Trolley Line a short distance east of Grigg Avenue.” Grigg Avenue is now St. Roch's Avenue.
Charles Hale authored the ‘Index of Greenwich Graves.’ It was compiled as a WPA Project in the early 1930’s.
The Hale Map Index on page 471 shows a cemetery in the vicinity, called the "Mead Plot on Byram Shore”, described in Mead's survey on Page 140 as “Near the Trolley Line a short distance east of Grigg Avenue”, which avenue is now known as St. Roch’s Avenue. The actual distance straight line is 0.07 miles. The area is described as “a driveway,” with graves apparently removed.
A survey by Aidan McCann, PLS, Soundview Engineering dated January 26, 2004 indicated that this long-removed plot was located off Charles Street between Josephine Evaristo Avenue and Hamilton Avenue.
Spencer P. Mead’s survey lists 12 persons buried there, the earliest being Jabez Hobby in 1823, who was joined by Abigail Hobby in 1847. Between 1839 and 1859 eight Meads were buried there, along with Sarah L. Martin 1849 and Mary E. Oliver, 1851.
The late Greenwich Town Historian William E. Finch stated that the graves were relocated to Union Cemetery.
The following is a listing of ancestors who were interred at this site:
Abigail Hobby, died June 16, 1847, aged 84 years, 4 months and 26 days.
Jabez M. Hobby, died December 23, 1823, aged 66 years, 11 months and 11 days.
Sarah L. Martin, wife of Jacob Martin, died May 30, 1849 aged 38 years, 3 months and 26 days.
Henry H. Mead, son of Jabez H. and Harriet Mead, died March 9, 1849, aged 2 years and 8 days.
Jabez H. Mead, son of Nehemiah and Mary Mead, died June 26, 1850, aged 46 years, 5 months and 15 days.
Mary, Widow of Nehemiah Mead, died March 15, 1859, aged 74 years and 4 days.
Mary Lucretia Mead, daughter of Jabez H. and Harriet Mead, born January 26, 1839, died May 29, 1839.
Nehemiah Mead, died December 4, 1833, aged 54 years, 3 months and 13 days.
Oscar Hobby Mead, son of Jabez H. and harriet Mead, born February 26, 1842, died December 18, 1845.
Sarah Ann Mead, daughter of Jabez H. and Harriet Mead, born November 11, 1844, died August 4, 1845.
William A. Mead, son of Nehemiah and Mary Mead, died February 20, 1849, aged 35 years, 7 months and 10 days.
Mary E. Oliver, daughter of William H. Oliver, died January 29, 1851 aged 16 years, 11 months and 10 days.
Spencer P. Mead (Buried in Putnam Cemetery, Greenwich, Connecticut)
New York Times Death Notice and Obituary: January 8, 1935
MEAD-On January 7, 1935. Spencer p. Mead in his seventy-second year. Funeral service at the home of his brother, Ephriam Mead, 240 Milbank Av., Greenwich, Conn., on Wednesday, Jan. 9, 2 P.M.
SPENCER P. MEAD
New York Lawyer Wrote ‘Ye Historie of Greenwich’
Spencer P. Mead, descendant of one of the oldest and most prominent families in Greenwich, Conn., died yesterday at the Fifth Avenue Hospital of a gall bladder ailment after a short illness. Mr. Mead, who lived at 828 Union Street, Brooklyn, was 71 years old.
Mr. Mead was an examiner of real estate titles for the law department of the Lawyers Title Corporation, 160 Broadway, having been with the company since 1903, at which time it was called the Lawyers Title Insurance Company of New York.
Born in the old Mead homestead at Mead’s Point, Greenwich, he was the son of Mr. and Mrs. Isaac Howe Mead and was descended from William Mead, who came from England to Connecticut in the seventeenth century. He was the author of a book on the genealogy of the Mead family and of ‘Ye Historie of Greenwich.’ He was graduated from New York Law School.
Mr. Mead belonged to the Sons of the American Revolution and Society of Colonial Wars. Surviving are three brothers.
Should Have Good Roads: Greenwich Graphic: July 4, 1903
Mr. Solomon S. Mead Gives Some Suggestions-Thinks There is No Place Like Greenwich
Editor of the Graphic:
I am an advocate of good roads to Travel over for the few remaining days that I will be among you, and I know that good roads are everything to any country or town. There is nothing whatever that will boom a place like good roads.
But to have them you must have them worked and graded by a person who is competent to do the job. If you want your gold watch repaired when out of order you must employ a man who understands his business of the job will be worse after a poor workman has had it in charge than when you left it in his care, and so you must have a man to work a road who has some knowledge of what is needed.
If for the past one hundred years the roads had been properly worked they would now be in number one condition and there would be no cause to complain. But they are worked just as they have been for years; if there is a wall in the gutter, instead of blasting it a huge break is placed across the road to carry the water from one side to the other.
And the roads are made up so narrow that one horse has to travel on the ridge and the other in the gutter, and no matter how much space there is between the fences the roads are worked to a single track and only occasionally a place where one can pass a loaded team in front of him or where one can pass a loaded team coming toward you.
The roads are all too narrow and I can show roads that have been narrowed up in the past two years from three to four feet. To me this is all wrong and no road should be worked less than twenty-five feet across and in no instance a break should be permitted on any road. If it is necessary for the water to pass from one side of the road to the other let it be done with a pipe; iron is best, earthen would do.
I know it is very hard for persons who have schooled themselves to work a road in the old way to change, but the change must come and will come if the present road makers will insist on the old way, give the roads to someone who will.
My idea of working roads would be to first draw a line on each side as far as it could be done conveniently and make the place straight if the distance was long or short, and where a rock interferes with the gutter blast it out. Have the road as wide as twenty or twenty-five feet and not round it up too much, but enough so all the surface water would run off its sides, not follow the wheel track. And above all never go into a road-bank or a lot of dirt or gravel when there are hundreds of hillocks all along the roadway that should first be removed, by ploughing and carting where it may be needed. I see hundreds of these knolls all along the roads I travel about Greenwich.
I feel very proud of the town that gave me birth and I hope to see it still improved and everyone that belongs in Greenwich should take an interest in its welfare. I never felt one half so proud of my native town as I do today, because I have seen more of good, and bad, that has been presented to my view.
Now let every body go for good wide and well-graded roads and if one will not do it get someone that will. Let the old foggies go.
I am truly disappointed in the working of the highways this season. That the roads are very rough and uneven and so narrow up from four to six feet that it is very dangerous for driving when one meets say half a dozen automobiles one after another, and the autos are bound to keep the road and on a one track road it is very dangerous driving, and the roads are so uneven and they seem to me worse then I have known them for years by and gone.
I will say here that the auto drivers are generally a class of hogs. An exception is Richard Carpenter, of the Upper King Street Road. He always gives all he can to the driving horse class and stops his auto if he sees any horse afraid.
I must say that I do not think I have miscalled or mis-classed the auto drivers. I find they in general do not pay any attention to raising the hand when coming, but on the contrary will keep as near the middle of the road as possible and often they will turn their machine right in front of the horse. I hope someone will put the law in force and bring the autos to know their place, and if they frighten a horse and upset the carriage they will run on the faster to avoid being known I wish every driver of a horse would see the law is complied with.
SOLOMON S. MEAD
Six Generations of Meads, Deacons
Greenwich News and Graphic: February 14, 1919
Charles N. Mead Presents New Bell to Commemorate Deacon Ancestors
Announcement was made at the morning service of the Second Congregational Church last Sunday, that Charles N. Mead had presented a bell for the new spire, in memory of six successive generations of deacons in his family, serving this church for nearly 200 years.
It will be a victory and peace bell, bearing the inscription “Glory to God in the Highest, and on Earth Peace, Good Will Toward Men.” It will be cast at the Meneely Works in Troy, and probably will be installed by Easter Sunday.
The old bell, which was taken down and placed in one of the horse-sheds at the rear of the church, while the spire was being rebuilt, had become cracked from being overheated in a fire which broke out in the sheds some time ago, and instead of the former clear tones of the bell, which were most pleasing to the ear, it had sounded muffled of late.
For many years the spire of this church has been a guide for seafaring men on Long Island Sound. The church itself stands on the highest point of and along the Sound between New York and New London.
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| This is an old image of the Isaac Lewis Mead Building at the top of Greenwich Avenue. The building is still there. |
