This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Surnames: Rudd, Brewster, Brush, Smith, Eno, Sherman, Conklin, Sutherland, Hopkins, Shepherd, Smith, Dakin, Winchell, Hartwell, Eggleston, Spencer, Johnston, Hawley, Wooden, Hammond, Ketterer, Dibble, Reynolds, Fairchild, Bostwick, Myers, Stissing, Pulver, Taylor Classification: Obituary Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/VRB.2ACE/1644.1 Message Board Post: My cousin who had the originals of these clippings did not know what to do with them and recently sent them to me. Here follows a corrected copy of this obituary typed from the original. ===================================== IN MEMORIAM CHARLES RUDD Mr. Charles Rudd deceased in the town of Gallatin, Columbia County, N.Y. at his residence on Friday February 18, 1910. Had he lived seventeen days more he would have completed his ninety years. The funeral was at his dwelling on the following Monday February 21, at 11:30 a.m. conducted by Rev. Frank R. Bouton a Methodist minister, and the burial in his family lot in Evergreen Cemetery, Pine Plains. To go back three generations Zebulon Rudd married Jerusha Brewster a descendant of the Brewster immigrant, who came over on the Mayflower. Their son Bezaleel Rudd married Ruth Brush of the Brush family who with Reynolds' families emigrated from Horse Neck (Greenwich) Conn. to Great Nine Partners in 1765 or thereabout, and settled in the northwest part of Amenia as now. This early settlement of the Brush and Reynolds and maybe others was called "City" near and a little north of the now Smithfield Church as the dwellings, three or four or more were near together. The Brush farm was part of the Capt. John H. Conklin farm, in more recent times the "Slee farm," about four miles northeast of the "City" and on that farm was the Brush family burying ground. In that burial place (no yard there now) are two dark slate head stones on which respectfully is inscribed: "Sacred to ye memory of Mr. Reuben Brush who died June ye 6th 1774. A E 61." "In memory of Mrs. Isable Brush who di! ed June ye 15. 1772. A E -- yrs." There were other burials in this yard the last being in 1812. I am not an authority at this writing but infer that Ruth Brush wife of Bezaleel Rudd was a daughter of Reuben Brush above. In the sixth regiment in Charlotte Precinct of which David Sutherland was Colonel and Roswell Hopkins Lieutenant Colonel at its organization in 1776, a change was made in 1778 when Sutherland resigned and Hopkins became Colonel. Further changes were made in the regiment in 1780, when Bezaleel Rudd was appointed quartermaster, and the next year 1781 he was first Lieutenant in Captain Shepherds company in the same regiment. I leave the tree to the family, and follow my branch. One of the sons of Bezaleel Rudd and Ruth Brush was a son Reuben B. (Brush) who settled in Pokeepsie married Elizabeth Smith, built a brick building for a store I think the Wood and Tittamer site and tradition to me says was the first brick store in Pokeepsie. Here in Pokeepsie their son Charles, the deceased, was born March 7, 1820. A few years later the family emigrated to North East in this county and settled near a small lake about two miles northeast of Spencer's Corners, near the margin of this lake Reuben B. Rudd built his dwelling, and in commemoration thereof this lake was christened "Rudd's Pond," a name it bears to this day. Charles was around the sevens or eights in years, at this time, I have not exact date, but contemporaneous with his father were the families Dakin, Winchell, Hartwell, Eggleston, Spencer, Johnston, Benedict Hawley and many others who have given fame to "Spencer's Corner" and northeast in our early annals. In passing I will say, Northeast has a most interesting field yet unexplored for historical research. The children of these families were the schoolmates and associates of Charles. None of them heirs to luxury and indolence, but all had brain and muscle, the best thing child can heir, and they made each harder and stronger by work. Charles came to Pine Plains in the spring of 1837, and dates the beginning of our acquaintance. He commenced work in the harness shop of Emmott Wooden, but William Wooden father of Emmott was the proprietor. The shop was then in the now front parlor of the building of the late Isaiah Dibble store property. Two years later, 1839, the Pine Plains Bank was organized, and Henry R. Hammond an enterprising citizen of Pine Plains and at that time landlord of Ketterer's hotel, built by contract an annex on the west side of this building for the bank. It was two stories, the first for the bank, the second story Mr. Wooden had fitted with windows and otherwise for harness making and moved his business to the two rooms above, both making one room. The present G. Dibble store room was used by the Pine Plains Bank. Seventy-three years is hardly a breath of time worth noticing, yet to the persons who havn't arrived to that breath, the persons and things in this village and town when Mr. Rudd came here as he related them may be an interesting reminiscence. Walter Reynolds and his sister Julia, and two aunts Rachel and Betsey, lived next east in the brick dwelling now W. T. Myers. Mr. Reynolds, later a lawyer, had an office where the Bowman drug store is. Aaron E. Winchell and Samuel Fairchild were partners in merchandising in the old store now Charles Morgan corner, and Niles Hartwell a merchant on the opera house corner. West beyond this was a shoemaker named Barnes, and a harness shop by Rufus White. The only other merchant was Reuben W. Bostwick in the now Chase store made over. Henry C. Myers was landlord at now Stissing House, and Nicholas N. Pulver at now Ketterer hotel. Epapaphroditus Taylor a shoemaker had a shop on the east part of R. D. Hicks building covered now by the barber shop. Mr. Taylor was also justice of the peace for a number of years, and the late Judge Barnard of Pokeepsie then a young man, came occassionally to Justice taylor's court and bewildered "intelligent jurymen" with "facts in the case," a! nd befogged the justice as well with "the law may it please your Honor." Next west of Taylor's shop was Carman the hatter shop. Between the Chase store and this hatter's shop was an alley as now which led to a plaza in the rear of Chase store, and the now Ketterer's hotel barn stood on the street north of Wolven's butcher shop and was moved back to its present position by Henry R. Hammond. He built the shed attached as now. Next east of W. T. Myers building was Alfred Brush a tailor corpulent and kind. He lived in the now William Dibble block house and his work shop was the now Anna Davis small building. Another tailor named Diamond had a shop in the second story of a small building next to the Bowman drug store. On the first story of this building Caroline Finch and Mary Rudd had a millinery shop. A year or so later Josephus D. Jordan had the upper story (Diamond having moved) for a law office. Moses Conger then commenced reading Blackstone and Kent with him. Mose! was one of us, all around good and social, became blind, yet was cheerful many years before he was taken to his grave. 'Tis his calamity and not his taking off that bring the tear. Poor Mose here; happy Mose there; would I make his epitaph. Of blacksmiths, Daniel Pulver had a shop opposite the now Brown blacksmith shop on south street, and Sanford Smith had a wagon and blacksmith shop combined west of Stissing house which was later used by William Myers, and Arba Platt made wagons employing from one to three men in a shop opposite Daniel Pulver on south street, in the later Huesler shop. Of lawyers besides Mr. Reynolds, and Mr. Jordan who I think came here the year before I did there were Stephen Eno venerable with silver locks and legal lore. William Eno his son, and James Lillie. Richard Peck came a little later and built an office on the Ketterer property later used for a post office and now pool room an annex to the hotel. The doctors were Cornelius Allerton and Dr. Davis. Of all the family names in the town now living on the farms of their fathers in '37 I can recall only Righter, Best, Pulver, Tripp, Germond and Hicks. Of his associates or "set" in the village of young men during the decade from 1837 to 1847, I could name a dozen or more, and Mr. Righter is the only one living. I was a few years his junior in years, and according to the age grade of society I was in the second class, but as I now remember I took notice all the same. As to his church going during these years he said, "I generally went to church (Methodist) Sunday mornings and in the afternoon read Paradise Lost, Pope or Byron, or rambled in the fields and mountain, either of which was deemed wicked and worldly minded by the strictly orthodox." Herein is the key to his religion and subsequent life work. He chose farming for his occupation, and in 1848 journeyed on horseback through the states of Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Pennsylvania to see the soil and methods of farming in those states, and came back not making a purchase. Soon after his return he purchased a farm in the town of Gallatin, Columbia County, married Frances Falk in 1849, grand-daughter of Isaac S! mith, Esq., a farmer and near neighbor, where he lived until his decease. I knew him here until 1852 when two children had been born and I went west. Homer, the Greek poet, wrote of his friend, "He was a friend of man and lived in a house by the side of the road." Sam Walter Foss puts it in verse this way: "There are hermit souls that live withdrawn, In the place of their self-content. There are souls like stars that dwell apart, In a fellowless firmament; Tehre are pioneer souls that blaze their paths, Where highlanders never ran, But let me live by the side of the road, And be a friend of man. "I see from my house by the side of the road, By the side of the highway of life, The men that press with the ardor of hope, The men who are faint with the strife, But I turn not away from their smiles nor their tears. Both, parts of an infinite plan, Let me live in my house by the side of the road, And be a friend of man." As to his religion, so called, he was deeply reverent, and his creed can be expressed in four words. "Thy will be done." He yielded all to the will of the great creative spirit, which he called Almighty rather than the common name God. "The Almighty knows, the Almighty governs," were his expressions. He saw this Almighty in the hills, the grass and the stream, and I have often thought that this love of nature, and natures God induced him to choose the farm life. There was a deep well of pure water in his soul, not manifest at the surface in every day life among men. His life is his best memorial, and is an unbroken chain of blessed memories. He left three sons, John, of New York City, Harry and Charles, of Pine Plains, two daughters, Mrs. Frank Eno, of Pine Plains, and Mrs. Elisha Sherman, of Glens Falls. ISAAC HUNTTING