|
a.
|
Note: Source: Early Settlers of West Farms Westchester County, N.Y.
Copied from the manuscript record of the late Theodore A. Leggett
With additions by A. Hatfield, Jr.
Edition of one hundred copies, New York, 1913, p. 21-24.
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
21-g7Le11 William7 James Leggett, Rev. Dr.,
born October 12, 1848
died October 28, 1925
married May 17, 1876 to Mary Eva Parsell
born July 6, 1856
died December 26, 1924
parents John V.A. Parsell and Fannie Price of New Brunswick, N.J.
Children (Leggett) 8: 4 boys, 4 girls ßThe information on the children of William7 may not be totally correct; in the material on Frances17-g8Le11, she is referred to as third of nine children, however in the Origin and Data of the Leggett Family, he only lists seven. It is probable that there were two children who died very young
17-g8Le11 Fannie8 (Frances)
18-g8Le11 Paul8
19-g8Le11 Roy8 Parsell
20-g8Le11 Carl8
21-g8Le11 Alan8
22-g8Le11 Ralph8
23-g8Le11 Elsie8
They lived in Nyack, N.Y.
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
New York Births and Baptisms, Eastern Region, 1660-1916
Viewing records 11-20 of 46 Matches
<< Previous 10 | Next 10>> Page: 1 2 3 4 5 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Baptism Record of Reformed Church: Claverack, (Columbia County) Reformed Church 1727-1899
Baptism Date: 28 Jan 1849
Father: William Leggett
Mother: Emily A. Sergant
Item #: 6711
Child: William James
Birth Date: 12 Oct 1848
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
From the alumni file of the State University of New Jersey - Rutgers. The following is a typed document, numbered, untitled and not signed, It looks as though it was the speech about William7, given by Dr. W.H.S. Demarest to the 1926 football dinner?
William7 James Leggett was born at Ghent, Columbia County, New York, October 12, 1848. It was his good fortune to be born in a household of faith and of devotion to the church. His father, grandfather, great-grandfather, and great-great grandfather were elders in the Church of Claverack. The family was of English descent not Dutch; it came to this country early and settled in that Hudson River country, where the Dutch and their church prevailed; and so it came into the Dutch Reformed connection. Ghent, the family home. at the time of this boy's birth was five miles from Claverack, a house built in 1750 still standing, but Claverack was the home church. Connection there was as early as 1726, and a Leggett was officer from about that time. The family drove there for worship yet in the generation with which we have to do, every Sunday over the roads, good or bad as they might be, quite ignorant of the brief time the modern motor would require for the trip over a modern road. There were three sisters and two brothers in the family he to be the last living of the five. The Reverend Ira Condict Boice, born near New Brunswick and named for the acting president of Queen's College was pastor of the church when he was born. From the time he was eleven years of age until he was seventeen, the Reverend Acmon P. Van Gieson was pastor, the thinker and preacher of remarkable talent, later so long the minister of the minister of the Poughkeepsie Church, intimate friend of my father, (David D. Demarest) who, from 1852 to 1865, was minister of the Hudson Church near by- in the parsonage in which I was born- when William7 J. Leggett was a lad of fifteen. It was in Mr. Van Gieson's time, I imagine, that he received into the church's full communion. But when he was eighteen years of age the Reverend Francis N. Zabriskie, the scholarly, facile and witty writer, succeeded Mr. Van Giesen, and it was in his time that the now grown young man went away to college. No doubt each of these ministers had his share in encouraging the boy of this God-fearing home toward the higher education and toward theological study; perhaps his own immediate religious favor was really responsible for his leaving the farm and entering the gospel ministry.
School, the most desirable school, was not just at home but it was much nearer than a good school was to the usual farm community. The Rev. Alonzo Flack was in charge of it and it had for many years a wide reputation, a large patronage. Its great building stood in a grove back from the road, many of us have seen it in its disuse in very recent years. To it came boarding students from all parts of the country, and to it came students in daily attendance from the communities near by. (It was Methodist in its background but families of all churches patronized it) To it every day came William7 J. Leggett from his home at Ghent. Fair inference may be drawn from his academic record later on that he was a good student in the school. A special item of those days was a measure of military training and in the organized company of students he was captain. We can well imagine that he had then something of the large physical presence and force and dignity of bearing, with aptness of mind and spirit, which gave him leading place in college sports later on. And probably in all the school sports he was busy and proficient.
He left home for college a little older than the average student. He was twenty years of age when in 1868 he entered Rutgers College. He went to that College, no doubt, because it was the old college founded and fostered and attended by Dutch Church people. Neither Mr. Van Gieson or Mr. Zabriskie, it happened, was a graduate of Rutgers; both were from New York University. But both were graduates of the New Brunswick Theological Seminary and their encouragement would naturally be toward that Seminary and toward the college so closely allied with it.
No doubt the young man was entering college with the established purpose of going on into the Seminary and the ministry. The college catalogue of his college years all register him as from Hudson. At college he took up his residence in Hertzog Hall on the Seminary campus.
The Class of 1872 at Rutgers of which he was a member was a class of no small promise; many well known families were represented in it; its members came to much position and usefulness in life. There were 39 of them, of whom 29 graduated. Eight of the 39 became ministers, one of them my eldest brother. One became the foremost university teacher of English in the United States. Another became a distinguished engineer and railroad official. One became a financier and investor of large relationships. Another became a highly honored educator in the far east. In this fine group of young men preparing for the world's work William7 J. Leggett took leading place. He was a good student and a faithful worker. He was a more than average man in speech on the college platform. In his sophomore tear, among the eight chosen orators, he received the first prize. In his junior year he was a junior orator. In his senior year he took the prize in mathematics. When it came to graduation, his four-year record proved to have won for him the first honor. This meant his giving at Commencement the Latin Salutatory. Of course he was one of the elect to be taken into the Phi Beta Kappa Society. During his course he was a member of the Deltas Upsilon Fraternity, and of the Philoclean Literary Society. He was vice-president and captain of the Boat Club and director of the Base-ball Club and president of the Targum (college paper) Association.
He continued his active participation in sports and by it gained a certain special reputation grown greater with the passing years until now. The amazing proportions of the foot-ball program of to-day, its universal vogue among the colleges and universities and its immense hold upon the American people, have accentuated what seemed a small matter at the time, the fact that William7 J. Leggett was a chief player and though but a sophomore, the captain of one of the two college teams playing the first intercollegiate foot-ball game played in this country. A more or less informal foot-ball play had begun at Princeton, and it had begun at Rutgers, the two playing in a little different fashion, each from the other. It was a natural proposal that a contest be arranged, and the game, twenty-five on a side, was held at New Brunswick November 6, 1869. The captain of the Princeton team was William S. Gummere, now chief justice of the Supreme Court of New Jersey. The game was won by Rutgers. Soon Princeton, Yale, Columbia and Rutgers organized the first Intercollegiate Foot-ball Association and the game was started on its way to its present quite incredible position in college life. One hundred and fifty men, perhaps, witnessed the game that now in an afternoon 80,000 perhaps gather to see. He was also on the six oar college crew, which raced the crew from Laurence Scientific School, Harvard, on the Raritan in 1870. His early interest in the military brought him to some service, while he was in college or in seminary, training the boys in the college preparatory school.
Entering the Theological Seminary at graduation, he was graduated there in 1875. There were nine men in his Seminary class, five of them from his class in Rutgers College. His professors there were Dr. Samuel M. Woodbridge, Dr. John DeWitt, Dr. Joseph F. Berg, and Dr. David D. Demarest. Just as he entered, the two new buildings, the Sage Library and Suydam Hall were built, adding incalculably to the working resources, of that ancient institution of the church. His formal studies were not ended with the seven years in New Brunswick. Twelve or fifteen years later he took up courses of study at New York University receiving there the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in 1891.
Graduated from the Seminary, Mr. Leggett licensed as a preacher by the Classis of Hudson, and he was soon ordained and installed at the church of Schodack Landing. He was pastor there for seven years, then at Claverack for seven years, then at Belleville for four years, then at Nyack for eight years, then at Chatham for sixteen years - five pastorates, all in the Reformed Church, 42 years in the active charge of churches. All his churches under him had good prosperity. In beginning at Schodack Landing he was settling not far from his father's home. In his pastorate at Claverack he had the rare experience of serving the church in which he had been brought up, in which his father had been an elder. His father died while he was in the Seminary in 1874; his mother died while he was serving that home church, in 1885. Only one charge was in New Jersey, Belleville. While he was at Nyack the Chapel or parish house was built. His last and longest pastorate, at Chatham, ended in 1917. Since then he had made his home again at Nyack and had continued preaching and other active service as occasion appeared. For a period between pastorates he was Nyack's continuous supply. For eight years, most of the time, he lived a life of freedom from responsible routine but of devotion to all the ideals and enterprise of the Christian ministry.
Dr. Leggett's service was not simply to the several churches of his formal pastorate and to scattered various churches, but as well to the higher church bodies of which he was at times a member. In the several classes of his residence he was always a source of wisdom and of strength as ministers and laymen counseled concerning the affairs of the Kingdom. So it was in Particular Synod. He was depended upon to serve on important committees. The Particular Synod of Albany made him its president in 1904. The General Synod made him its vice-president in 1918 and in 1924. He was at one time a member of the Board of Superintendents of the New Brunswick Seminary and he was its President in 1910.
In any remembrance of the manner of the man that Dr. Leggett was, in any word concerning him, the physical, least important perhaps, naturally comes first. He had distinction by reason of his more than average height, the symmetry of his build, his erectness, the dignity of his bearing. It was no small asset in his meeting his fellow men, his meeting life in general. His presence commanded respect at ounce. In the pulpit he was a commanding figure. On the street one would glance at him a second time. His word on any occasion seemed to have from it an added weight. It was clean-cut, alert, expressive. It seemed in keeping with his voice and from of speech and type of thought. And it was fine the way he kept his erectness, his physical vigor, virtually to the last. At the inauguration of the new Rutgers president at New Brunswick on October 14, I talked with him and I said to him - "Ah, you hold your own better than your old time friend, the Chief Justice, who was near him that day.": yet I thought his face was a little altered: and two weeks later he was gone.
Than one would speak of the intellectual, of the mind, with which he was endowed. This talent of his was made plain, as has been said, in his early years, in his college course, in his gaining of mathematics prize and of the four-year first honor - and we may say in his oratory of that time as well for that certainly was in measure born of the mind behind it. I do not recall that it was ever my privilege to hear him preach: others telling of that, would, I imagine, tell of clear thinking, of careful searching of the Word, of happy choice of words. On the floor of a church judicatory he was certainly clear and convincing in statement, in argument always. Three years ago at Rutgers Commencement, the fiftieth anniversary of his graduation, he was presented by his fellow alumni with a loving cup in honor of his foot-ball captaincy in that original college play. His response in receiving it, was one of the choicest little speeches that I ever heard. It was but five minutes. He said just what it was right and fine to say. He said it in such well chosen words. He said it fluently, strongly so that all in the great room could hear, yet quietly and with feeling. The applause that greeted him told how happy the whole assembly thought him in the not easy situation. Many a comment was made not then alone but later. And it especially led to his being asked to represent his Seminary class at the fiftieth anniversary of its graduation last May, 1925. Then again, only six months, at greater length and more prepared he spoke with strength and fluency, with ... memory, and keen humor. At the age of seventy seven his mind was still working at its best.
And I think of him as of some special aptness in the understanding and presentment of matters of legal or constitutional sort. Do I mistake him in thinking that he had something of the legal and judicial mind? In committees of the judicatories, chairman, he could draw a report which divided clearly the accurate from the inaccurate, the truth from the error, the wiseness from the mistakeness. In the questions arising not seldom as to the constitutionalness of action, as to the merits of proposed amendments, as to judgment upon question of procedure, he was one to study the problem carefully, to bring in a well-digested treatment of the question, a recommendation quite sure to command support and confirmation. No one could think of him as a presiding officer of less than full command of all assembly proceedings, of dignified, immediate, vigorous and correct dealing with every situation that might arise.
With all such deposition and aptness one recognizes at once Dr. Leggett's conscientiousness and courage of conviction. He was a man eager to know his duty, courageous to do his duty. I do not think that any one could ever think of him as trifling with the thinks committed to his charge or as ever afraid to step out into the way that seemed marked out to him by the wisdom and the Power to whom he gave allegiance. He was not, I imagine, lenient to himself, or indulgent of any weakness. He certainly served his day and generation in word and deed with a good conscience toward God and without fear of men.
Then, if that seem at all severe or rigid, we think at ounce of his friendliness, of his graciousness. He was very agreeable in his personal relationships, in his passing contacts. He welcomed the chance to do a friendly service as any day or hour might present it. His activity and success in forming young people into bodies of devotion and service must have been born in no small degree from a friendly spirit that young people recognized and reacted to. In his final years I have no doubt, his spirit more than ever was a gracious temper known of all who passed him at the many cross roads of live, so that affection abounded as well as the respect which his physical presence and sturdy character always commanded. In the daily paper of this town the day before his death this was said: "There are a few men and women of Nyack whom every body seems to claim as friends, whether they have a personal acquaintance or not. They have a 'public acquaintance' that perhaps means a little more than to be able to give the friendly nod and the daily salutation. Attention has been attracted to them because of the things they have done for others. They are happy in doing and want nothing said about their good works. The Rev. William7 J. Leggett is one of these wonderful characters. The older people think of him when he was active as pastor of the Nyack Reformed Church. The younger folks see him with slower steps, kindly and pleasant, filling the pulpits of absent clergymen, and all appreciative of his desire to be useful despite the fact that his limbs may tremble with age."
The passing touch upon the qualities of Dr. Leggett which have commanded our respect, our gratitude and our affection would not be complete without a final word, telling his ideals of the spirit, his sincerity of religion, his consecration to the work of the Gospel of his Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. In the consecrating of his and widely adaptable life, his telling personality, to the preaching of the grace that is in Christ, to the fulfilling of the great commission to do good works in the Master's name, he summarily expressed the simplicity of his faith and of the redemption - experience which was his own. This one thing he must do. And from the first forming of his life-purpose I presume he never wavered in his whole-souled pursuing of his Christian enterprise. The gospel of the grace of God must have meant much to him always as he so unceasingly tried to make it real and effectual and fruitful in others. In him we find something which we wish so much were present, showing itself in the same way, in many who stand where he stood just fifty years ago - a spirit of genuine and self devoting faith and zeal which sees the life-pathway for it nothing else and nothing less than the ministry of the church of God. The world-wide need, the state of our American social and civic life, the pulpit throne of the churches in all our communities, call for the virile, able, commanding personalities to be the prophets of the age, the voices of the truth, that divine revealing which alone can change the heart and make this old world pass away and bring in the new heaven and the new earth, that Kingdom which is righteousness and peace. Would that the life and the evangel of this servant of God departed, our friend, might lure more than one young man to-day or to-morrow at life's threshold into that highest of all callings, the preaching of the Word. For they that - turn many to righteousness shall shine as the stars forever: and the path of the just is as the light that shineth more and more unto the perfect day.
It is fitting that when a servant of God has served well his day and generation we should pause and gather up our common thought concerning him: that the Church of Jesus Christ should voice its feeling for a minister who for fifty years wrought in its ministry; that friends should assemble their gracious memories of a friend they have loved long since and lost awhile. For this we do well to gather to-night in this House of God where he whom we remember served in holy things and where in his last years he again made his spiritual home. Would that there were one more familiar than I with his daily life and ways of service to speak to you and for you on this occasion.
also from the Alumni files:
WILLIAM JAMES LEGGETT Chatham, N.Y.
Son of William5-g6Le2 Leggett, a farmer of Ghent, Columbia County, N.Y., and Emily Augusta Sargent, daughter of Frazier Sargent and Persis Lovell of Stockport, N.Y. Born October 12, 1848, Ghent, N.Y., where he lived till he entered college. Prepared for college at District School and Hudson River Institute, Claverack, N.Y. Received Philoclean Society Prize for declamation Freshman year and prize for best original oration Sophomore year. Myron W. Smith Memorial first prize Sophomore year. President of class Sophomore year. First president of Targum Association. Marshal president of Philoclean Society. Junior orator. Bradley Mathematical Prize Senior year. Phi Beta Kappa. Second honor and Latin oration at graduation. College Boat crew 1869, 1870 and 1871. Captain football team 1869 and 1870. Captain of winning team in first intercollegiate football game played in America November 6th, 1869, Rutgers vs Princeton. Delta Upsilon. New Brunswick Theological Seminary 1872-1875. New York University, post graduate courses, 1889-1891. Licensed Classis of Hudson May 24th, 1875. Ordained Classis of Rensselaer May 31st, 1875. Pastor of Reformed churches: Schodack Landing, N.Y., 1875-1882; Claverack, N.Y., 1882-1889; Belleville, N.J., 1889-1893; Nyack, N.Y., 1893-1901; Chatham, N.Y., 1901-1917. A.B., Rutgers, 1872; A.M., Rutgers, 1875; Ph.D., N.Y. University, 1891. President of Particular Synod of Albany 1904. President of Board of Superintendents of New Brunswick Theological Seminary 1910. Republican. Avocations: Croquet, tennis and bicycling. Married May 17th, 1876, in Brunswick, N.J., Mary Eva Parsell, daughter of John V.A. Parsell and Fannie Price. Children: Fannie17-g8Le11, Paul18-g8Le11, Roy19-g8Le11 Parsell, Carl20-g8Le11, Alan21-g8Le11, Ralph22-g8Le11 and Elsie23-g8Le11. Alumni relative: Frank J. Sagendorph, 1887, cousin. Articles in religious and local papers.
New York Times, October 29, 1925
Rev. Dr. W7.J. Leggett Dies of Paralysis
National Vice President of Reformed Church - Intercollegiate Football Pioneer
NYACK, N.Y., Oct. 28 - The Rev. Dr. William7 J. Leggett, Vice President of the Reformed Church organization of the United States, died in his home here today from paralysis, with which he was stricken on Saturday. He had celebrated his seventy-seventh birthday recently.
Dr. Leggett was born at Ghent, New York. He was educated at Claverack School, on the Hudson: Rutgers University and the New Brunswick (N.J.) Theological Seminary, entering the ministry in 1875. He filled pastorates of Reformed churches at Schodack's Landing, Claverack and Chatham, N.Y., and Belleville, N.J.
Eight years ago he gave up pastoral work for executive duties with the national organization.
Dr. Leggett had the distinction of having played in the first collegiate game of football on record in this country, that between Rutgers and Princeton in 1869, being captain of the Rutgers team. Undergraduates and the Facuity of Rutgers recently presented to him a gold cup in commemoration of his services as football captain and as stroke of the crew.
He leaves two daughters, Miss Fanny17-g8Le11 Leggett and Mrs.23-g8Le11 John L. Sly, and two sons, Alan21-g8Le11 and Carl20-g8Le11 Leggett.
New York Times, October 29, 1925
LEGGETT - William J., Oct . 28, 1925, at Nyack, N.Y. Funeral services at Nyack Reformed Church, Friday, Oct. 30, at 1 P.M. Interment Claverack, N.Y., on Oct. 31, at 10:30 A.M.
Alumni Monthly, December 1925, with photo
ßThis article contains much of that which appears in the New York Times, but with the following:
... in 1917 he retired from active ministry, but frequently preached as a pulpit supply. ... At the football game between Rutgers and Pennsylvania Military College on October 31 the Rutgers undergraduates stood with bared heads and sang "On the Banks" in tribute to the memory of Rutgers first leader in the gridiron sport.
Dr. Leggett was a familiar figure about the campus and was well known by the majority of the undergraduates. He was a speaker at the football dinner following the successful season of 1924 and was present at the inauguration of Dr. John Martin Thomas on October 14 this year. Two years ago he was presented with a silver cup by the undergraduates of the university in recognition of his services as captain of the first Rutgers football team.
Alumni throughout the country greatly regret the passing of this loyal and lovable alumnus who has gained much distinction for the university because of his life of service and achievement.
TRIBUTE
"Editor of THE MONTHLY:
"Let me pay my tribute of memory and affection to William7 J. Leggett '72. I felt drawn to him when he first entered college, as a very promising student. I was in '69 and he in '72, but of the same fraternity. On leaving my post in Japan at the interior city of Fukui for the capitol and the Imperial University of Tokyo, I sent word to Leggett, offering him the position. He declined and Martin H. Wyckoff, his classmate, accepted and made a noble record, both as teacher and philanthropist in Japan. Leggett joined the first company of football players of 1870, out of which grew the initial Rutgers squad for the later intercollegiate game with Princeton; of which original company I was a member. A pure, clean, fruitful career has been that of him whose loss from among us we now mourn."
William Elliot Griffis '69"
Daily Home News, Friday, January 8, 1926
Son of First Grid Captain at Rutgers To be Alumni Guest
Alan21-g8Le11 Leggett of Nyack, N.Y., son of the late Dr. William7 J. Leggett, captain of the first Rutgers football team of 1869, will be the guest of Rutgers University at the annual football dinner to be held in Ballantine Gymnasium next Wednesday evening under the auspices of the association of campus activities. Tickets for the dinner were places on sale yesterday.
Speakers will be Dr. John M. Thomas, president of the University; Dr. W.H.S. Demarest, former president; John B. Foster of the New York Sun, and George Foster Sanword, former football coach. Head Coach Jack Wallace will award letters and football certificates.
[Continued in the notes to Mary Eva Parsell, wife of William James Leggett, as lack of space in the notes data entry field precludes continuing here.]
|
