I’ve mentioned in other of my family line writings that Grandfather Boardman was born in 1874, a fact that continues to make me feel strangely connected to an era or two previous to my own. His parents were each exceptional and shall be suitably memorialized in other posts, but suffice it to say here that they were Professor Samuel Ward Boardman (II) and Sarah Elizabeth Greene Boardman. Now, look to your family tree and see if you can get that far.
This family line pair brought a total of nine children into the world, but most of these did not survive to be older adults. In fact, by the time my grandfather was born, number seven in his family line progression, his parents had already suffered the losses of his most closely-aged siblings, Caroline and Henry (ages 3 and 1), who each died of fever two days apart while Sarah was pregnant with Samuel. This left the Boardmans with their four older children, the third of whom, “Georgie,” passed away at age nine when Sam was but fifteen months old.
Next in the family line was a little brother when Sam was two, making up a family line of five remaining children – Mary, Elizabeth, Anna, Samuel and Roger. Unfortunately, the excruciatingly familiar sadness was not over because Mary died at age twenty as Sam approached his eighth birthday and three years later Anna passed away at age seventeen while her mother carried the last family line sibling, Martha, in her womb.
I write this litany of joy and trauma to illustrate that things were much different for the family line back then. So many dealt with unspeakable sorrow on a relatively frequent basis due simply to their inability to stave off the life-threatening family line illnesses of the day.
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| Samuel Ward Boardman Jr - 1878 |
Born in Auburn to a 37-year-old mother, Sam spent his earliest years in nearby Lisle, New York. At age 15, his father having been called to the position of president of Maryville College in Tennessee, accepted, left his pastorate and the family took up residence there in September, 1889. Soon after, Sam, now the eldest boy in the family line, was enrolled in the college prep school.
Although it wasn’t until 1907 that Professor Boardman formalized his family line aspirations for his two remaining sons in “An Informal Will” it’s apparent that his desires for Sam had been instilled in the youngster much earlier and cultivated.
“My general desire,” said Sr., “is that Sam should bring to bear whatever force he can to make laws and constitutions better and the current administration of them better, in his own private practice and also in wider spheres, and so make a life-long study of these things accordingly without much reference to whether in office or out; I think Sam has some judicial turn of mind.”
Apparently, Sam agreed. Upon his graduation from Maryville College, he was off to Harvard and ultimately to law school at New York University. Although over time he became proficient in a number of different niches of the law, his primary specialties were title and municipal law, the latter of which he exercised in the incorporation of Cedar Grove, New Jersey, where he lived from 1910 to 1951.
Samuel Boardman, Jr. was the father of quite a lengthy family line generation. Typically, a generation, the average time between the birth of parents and the birth of their children is about thirty years. Sam didn’t marry until he was thirty-four and his first child was born a year later.
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| Sam and his son, William - My Father |
He and his wife, Charlotte Katharine Tice Boardman, proud female branch of my family tree, proceeded to build their little family line of girls over the course of eight years. By way of surprise, my father, came along fifteen years later making him the finishing family line touch!
Having spent quite some time reading the correspondence from the span of his life, it’s evident that Grandfather was raised to be a God-fearing man. By virtue of entering the bar in 1899, and establishing his Newark, New Jersey practice, he was also then an attorney which made him what today would be something of an enigma: a God-fearing attorney. Add to this the fact that he was a lifelong Democrat and at least to my way of thinking he was a pretty rare bird!
Whether it was just that schools were so different back then or that Sam was an incredibly bright student, I’m not sure, but he excelled in mathematics, languages, music and family line history. The latter of these talents manifested itself in his authorship of “From Then To Now…A History Of Cedar Grove,” a booklet published in the early 1950’s recounting the stories of the small town and its people whom he served in various capacities for 39 years. My family tree studies are the richer for it.
In early 1955, when asked by his doctor, also interested in the family line, how old he was, Sam responded with an insight into some of his math ponderings:
“I’m 80 years, 4 months and 22 days, in other words 29,363 days.”
The doctor then asked how long he had been counting.
“Since I was 80. The Bible says ‘So teach us to number our days that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.’ Each morning early I add one to the number of my days and then amuse myself by factoring the total.”
A few days later, describing all this in a family line letter he said, “How it changes factors from day to day. Today - 29,370 – has these prime factors: 2x3x5x11x89. Yesterday’s total seems to have as prime factors only 43 and 683.” Little did I know, when I began looking into my family tree, all that I would learn!
One “factor” in Grandfather's entertaining himself this way may have been the fact that he suffered from glaucoma which rendered him legally blind for his final 15 years or 5,480 days and may also explain some of the time he had for looking into the family line.
Much to my own consternation, he sometimes wrote his pre-blindness letters in French or Latin just for the fun of it. I can only assume he wrote these to recipients whom he knew would understand them.
Not to be impeded by the silly fact that he could no longer see, he began typing his family line correspondence with quite a lot of success. Although in his earlier days he possessed a very nice legible hand, the fact that much of his collected communications are typewritten comes as a significant benefit to those of us who read them. My collection of his writings have certainly enriched my own study of my family tree, since Grandfather often sprinkled his letters with family line information.
Samuel Ward Boardman, Jr. went to be with his Lord Jesus on July 5, 1956, twelve days prior to my first birthday. How can I encourage you in singing your ancestors? For the singing of Samuel’s praises, I’ve combed the family line archives for his letters, effects and ancillary information about him. It’s been a joy and has made me wish all the more that I’d been able to know him the way I knew my maternal grandfather.
In the combing I’ve found some special family line indications, not the least of which is the fact that Grandfather Boardman not only understood the laws of man, but he thoroughly understood the laws of God and made it his life’s work to live by them and convey them to his own family line.
His pastor said this of him at his memorial:
“The attempt to discover a single sentence which might appropriately convey to us the significance of the life which Mr. Boardman lived among us led to remembrance of the line in the Book of Proverbs, ‘The spirit of man is the candle of the Lord.’”
Among the many rays of light Grandfather left along his way were a goodly number of what he called “versifications.” These were his own poems, some pertinent to the family line, but many of which were paraphrases of Scripture. His metrical interpretation of Psalm 91 begins this way:
The man who dwells within God’s
secret place
Shall rest beneath the shelter of
His grace.
Of God, the Lord, I’ll say “My
refuge he:
In Him I’ll trust, He shall my fortress
be.”
I’ve spent many, many hours researching my family tree. It’s an honor to be able to connect the members of my family line. But inasmuch as the gathering of names, dates and places is fulfilling, how much more privilege there is in having the opportunity and the ability to bring forth biographical bits from the lives that were responsible for my very being and which now constitute my own family tree. Grandpa Boardman, it’s been my pleasure to do so.
Your family tree and your family line await your attention. Why not occupy yourself soon with singing your ancestors?
They're there in your family line shoebox or family line file cabinet looking for the day you'll revive and esteem the memories of their family line lives - so well-lived but so long-forgotten.
The satisfaction I've derived from the research of my family line and the discoveries I've made hanging out on my family tree are almost immeasurable. I'd be willing to bet your family tree will yield a true harvest of family line abundance as well. After all, your family tree goes back into the eons just like mine.
Why not get to it? Your downstream family line will bless you for it!
For additional content on family line pastimes, you may want to refer to the following links:
Honor Your Family Line by Singing Your Ancestors
Family Line Tribute
Journaling Your Family Line and Your Family Tree Studies
Mining Family Line Nuggets
