This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Classification: Biography Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/an/oRB.2ACI/619 Message Board Post: Hi all, Found this in the Simkins file at Gloucester County Historical Society last night. The donator not noted on the page, but it is copied from over 2 full columns from the "Paulsboro Press" dated March 29, 1901. There is so much local history and data of genealogical worth in this, that I have typed most of it verbatim, though I divided into paragraphs, where the original did not. I may be stretching what I know of copyright limits by a few words, though I suspect after 102 years, those rights should be expired. Normally, I would break such a long post into parts anyway, but am still learning in laptop/webmail mode, and find my usual techniques not working. Anyway, this one is too precious not to share with the world and all my cousins on the list. So, Merry Chrstmas to you all. Enjoy!!! CELEBRATED THEIR GOLDEN WEDDING On Saturday, March 23, Mr. and Mrs. J. Wesley Thompson celebrated their Golden Wedding at their residence, Courses Landing, Salem county., It was a gala occasion to “Uncle Wesley” and "Aunt Mary Ann” and the eighty-odd friends who gathered to congratulate them on having reached the fiftieth milestone of their wedded life. Mrs. Annie Layton, of Pennsgrove, niece of Mrs. Thompson, and Ebner Simkins, a brother, now living in Camden, N.J., were the only ones present at the anniversary who were present fifty years ago, at the wedding supper. Rev. George Hichens, the officiating clergyman, has been dead several years. The evening was pleasantly spent in music, games and a phonographic entertainment given by E. E. Kiger,* of Course Landing. (*Elwood E. Kiger is my great great grandfather , and his sister Maggie married a Simkins, though the jury's still out on which one or where/when– vnc). Mrs. Elsh, Mrs. Dougherty and Mrs. Munion, of Pennsgrove, added greatly to the enjoyment of the occasion by their fine rendering of several songs. Supper was served from 4 to 11 p.m. to eighty-four persons. < snip – about 4 inches of column space, basically some flowery descriptions about gifts, including gold coins, a lamp, etc. > Mrs. Thompson was Mary Ann Simkins, daughter of Jonathan and Rachel Simkins. She was born May 1, 1826, on a farm owned by a Mr. Pough, of Wilmington, Del. This farm embraced the greater part of what is now North Pennsgrove. The farm buildings were located on the site of the Shiblie property; the house was a rambling structure, part of logs; a frame addition being added later. The log part was sold to Benjamin Reed, and moved farther back from the river on what is now Main Street. It is now occupied by Mr. Reed and has a plate on the front bearing this inscription: “Built in 1732”. Abner Simkins, son of Jonathan and Rachel Simkins, bought the frame part in 1869 and moved it to the farm (where he then resided) above Pennsgrove, and occupied by a Mrs. Straughn. The old house was utilized in erecting outbuildings. The Simkins family moved from the Pough property in 1840 to a farm up the river, now known as the William Lawrence farm, where they resided un! til the death of Mr. Simkins, which occurred in the autumn of 1851. In Mrs. Thompson’s earliest recollections of Pennsgrove, there were only three houses, the Pough farm house, a house and store kept by Harris Flannegan, now the property of S. R. Leap & Son, and one occupied by Abel Biddle upon the property now owned by Assemblyman Blohm. A school was taught two consecutive summers in this house by a Miss Phoebe Tindle. The nearest school after this closed, was known as the School House Green, about two and one-half miles from Pennsgrove, located on the Tommy Dolbow property. Mrs. Thompson often recalls incidents of those days when she and a younger brother went together to the School House Green, through the big woods most of the way, and how holding fast to each other’s hands they ran fearfully through the densest part, the frights from cattle that then pastured there, etc... The nearest place of worship was a Perkintown, possibly four miles away. Later, the Cove School House was built and meeting held there. She was! five years old when ground was broken for the brick building fronting the river, now owned by Joseph French, and occupied by Edward Green. It was built for a hotel and first occupied by a General Wolf, later, by a man named Kinsell. Mrs. Rachael Simkins was one of the market women (so familiar years ago) who followed the Wilmington markets. The last one of that party now living is Mrs. Ann Torbet, residing in Salem with her daughter, Mrs. Pierpont. Aunt Ann is an authority on history around Pennsgrove. Mrs. Thompson remembers the first steamboat, the “Huckleberry” built for the trade between Jersey and Wilmington. There were nine children born to Jonathan and Rachel Simkins, only tow of whom are now living, Mrs. Thompson, and her brother, Abner Simkins, now residing in Camden. Wesley Thompson was born in Lower Penn’s Neck, at Finn’s Point, in 1829, the youngest of twelve children of James and Edith Thompson, and the only one now living. In 1837, the family moved to Salem, and 1839 to the Carney Point farm where the Dupont Powder Works are located. In 1844 to the farm above Pennsgrove, adjoining the one occupied by Jonathan Simkins. Wesley had to cross only a field or two to do his courting. James Thompson died on this farm in the Spring of 1851. Wesley Thompson has been a successful farmer in Upper Neck for fifty years, and a familiar figure on Salem streets, whither he carted and sold his produce for the most of the last half of the nineteenth century. Those present at the Golden Anniversary were: Miss Emma B. Thompson, Mr. and Mrs. Jonas Whitsell, Mr., and Mrs. Elwood E. Kiger, Mr. and Mrs. William Sparks and daughter, Mr. and Mrs. John Brondiff, Carrie Brondiff, Arthur Brondiff, Mr. and Mrs. William Matlack, Mr., and Mrs. Lewis Wilson, Charles Thompson of Course Landing; Mr. and Mrs. Peter Sparks, Mr. and Mrs. Theodore Holton, Mr. and Mrs. Harry Black, Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Black, Mr. and Mrs. William Richman, of Sharptown; Mr. and Mrs. James Sharp, Mr. and Mrs. Damon Humphrey, Mr. and Mrs. Josiah Dubois, of Woodstown; Mr. and Mrs. John Bevis, Annie Layton, John Layton, Mr. and Mrs. George Davis and son, Ella Thompson, Clara Thompson, Harry Thompson, George Thompson, Margaret Elsh and son, Frank Walker and son, Mr. and Mr5s John Simkins, Mr. and Mrs. Charles Simkins and son, Mrs. Jonathan Denny, Mrs. Edith Dougherty, Mrs. Joseph K. Munion and two sons, Mrs. Joseph Flannegin and Minnie Boker of Pennsgrove; Mr(hole in pape! r) an Edwin L. Leonard son and daughter (blank) of Paulsboro; Miss Mable Swain of Bridgeton; Mrs. Alfred Dingee, of Landenburg, Pa; James H. Davidson, Florence Thompson, Mr. and Mrs. Abner Simkins, Mr. and Mrs. Jonathan Simkins and daughter, Mrs. Stone and son, Sara H. Thompson, of Camden; Edward Mitchell, Pennsville; Mrs. Sara Beckett, Swedesboro; George Kain, Mrs. Mary Crawford, and son, Couse Landing; John Redstr4ake and Daughter, Miss Elizabeth, of Salem. Among the coins were four $5 pieces bearing date of 1901; one $2.50 piece of 1851; one gold dollar of 1852, the year of the birth of Mr. and Mrs. Thompson’s eldest child.