myfourleggedstool
  • Home
  • About the Author
  • Blog
  • "The Immigrant"
    • Author's Interview
    • Published Reviews of The Immigrant
    • Resources for The Immigrant
    • 3 September 1650 Dunbar Scotland
    • November 1650 On the North Atlantic
    • Early Winter 1650 - 1651 Charlestown, Massachusetts Bay Colony
    • 22 April 1676 Concord, Massachusetts
    • August 12, 1676 Miery Swamp Bristol, Rhode Island
  • "The Believers"
    • Published Reviews of The Believers In The Crucible Nauvoo
    • 29 June 1844 Nauvoo, Illinois
    • July 1844 Peterborough, New Hampshire
  • Other Timelines
    • 19 April 1775 Concord, Mass
    • 11 July 1863 The First Assault on Morris Island
    • January 2009 Acton, Massachusetts
    • September 2009 Sharon, New Hampshire
  • Alfred's Four Legged Stool
    • Eleven Generations of John Law Descendants
    • John Law of Acton, Massachusetts
    • Reuben Law of Acton, Massachusetts and Sharon, New Hampshire
    • Re-dedication of Woollacott Square, 26 May 2015
    • John Woollacott of Atherington, Devon, England, patriarch of the Fitchburg Woollacotts
    • The Woollacotts of North Devon
    • Early Woollacotts and Variations thereon
    • Élisabeth Isabelle Salé, Les Fille du Roi
  • Jill's four legged stool
    • Russell Clark Germond and two generations of Ancestors
    • Some Chandler's of Androscoggin and Oxford Counties, Maine
    • Thrice-related, only a genealogist could be impressed by it
My first attempt at writing in register format was for a Massachusetts Society of Genealogists, Inc (MSOG) writing contest. Since I was beginning a trilogy on three ancestors, I figured that writing about them in register format would be a good first step and rather easy to do. Boy was I ever wrong. But thanks to the efforts of Helen S. Ullmann, I finally produced something worthy of publication. I have an enormous respect for those researcher who document meticulously their research and I continually strive to be like them, whether when writing in register format or simply documenting an ancestor for my personal data base.

My second effort, again for MSOG was about my great grandfather, John Woollacott. He met the criteria for the contest, an immigrant around the turn of the last century, who  worked in a mill. The contest in concert with the 100th anniversary of the 1912 "bread and roses" strike at the mills along the Merrimack River in Lawrence, Massachusetts. That strike was instrumental in changing child labor laws that were virtually non-existent before 1912. I always enjoy looking at old photographs as they  evoke so many images. Study any photograph of a young child working the mills at the turn of the last century and you will appreciate better that hackneyed expression, "A picture is worth a thousand words."

In 2007 my brother and I visited our "old sod", High Bickington, Devon, England, where there are more Woollacotts than Smiths. At the conclusion of our trip, I decided that a slew of photographs and accompanying negatives in paper wallets would soon be lost to the ages. So I made a "genealogical lite" photo journal of our trip. It has a greater likelihood of being found, dusted off and perused than dog-eared paper wallets of old photographs.

My Woollacott leg is very complete from my four-greats grandparents John and Mary (Down) Woollacott forward. It gets sketchier as I journey further back, even though High Bickington's Yelland Farm and Woollacott have a connection from 1602 to the present day. Thanks to the Wolcott family website, there is considerable information on the Woollacotts and variations thereon. Someday I hope to weave those early threads tighter with more objective evidence to extend past my four-greats grandfather.
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