"A critic is a bundle of biases held loosely together by a sense of taste." -- Whitney Balliett Whitney Balliett served as the New Yorker's jazz critic for over 40 years, from the mid-1950s into the early 21st century, and is also the author of fifteen or so books on the subject. A short biography can be found here: http://www.icebergradio.com/artist/230253/whitney_balliett.html This is his descent from John and Elinor: Whitney Lyon BALLIETT Dorothy LYON & Fargo BALLIETT Whitney LYON Israel Whitney LYON Lemuel LYON & Ann Frances7 (Israel6-Israel5-Daniel4-Benjamin3-John2-John1) WHITNEY. His son is Whitney Jr., so the name has held on an impressive century-and-a-half from its last use in this line as a surname. Here are a couple of online interviews; the second is aural, so you can hear his voice: http://www.jerryjazzmusician.com/mainHTML.cfm?page=balliett.html http://www.theconnection.org/shows/2001/02/20010206_a_main.asp Great-great grandmother Ann Frances Whitney Lyon did not live to share the exciting future her widower and children were to experience. In 1851, they sailed from New York aboard the Flying Cloud clipper around Cape Horn to the West Coast. Lemuel later served as consul in Japan. Below are some excerpts from their adventures. Cheers, Ron Kyser "Three of the passengers who came aboard to stow their belongings were Whitney Lyon and his two sisters, Ellen and Sarah, three members of a family from Chicopee Falls, Massachusetts; heading west. Their father, Lemuel Lyon, had recently returned from the Sandwich [i.e., Hawaiian] Islands, where he had successfully engaged in the California-Sandwich Islands trade. His had returned to Massachusetts to gather up his large family of six children, and begin to make the move West. Lemuel Lyon's wife, Ann Frances Whitney, had died nine years before." http://www.eraoftheclipperships.com/page24web4.html "September 17, 1851: Married on Wednesday evening, the 17th inst., on board by the Rev. T.D. Hunt, Mr. Reuben P. Boise of Portland, O.T., to Miss Ellen F. Lyon, daughter of Lemuel Lyon, of Roxbury, Mass, who arrived on the Flying Cloud's maiden voyage to San Francisco on September 1, 1851. " http://www.maritimeheritage.org/inport/1851.htm#lyonmarriage http://www.maritimeheritage.org/ships/barques.html "Mrs. [Ellen] Boise was a daughter of Lemuel Lyon, a Boston merchant, who went to California in the early '50s and came to Oregon about 1854, locating at Independence, where he built the second store building and the first grain warehouse in the town, becoming a prominent and successful man. Later he went to The Dalles and engaged in mercantile business, which he relinquished on his appointment as United States consul general to Japan. His death occurred at sea while en route home for a visit." http://www.open.org/~pioneerc/pg04.html "Mrs. [Sarah] Coffin's father was Captain Lemuel Lyon, also a pioneer of this city. Both families came to Oregon in 1862. Captain Lyon was appointed consul to Japan from The Dalles, to Kanagawa where he died. Captain Coffin was his secretary, who with his young son, now A.W. Coffin of Coffin Bros. of Yakima (Washington), brought the remains back to the states." http://archiver.rootsweb.com/th/read/OR-OLD-NEWS/2002-05/1021507744