The Old Settlers: Journey to Michigan

Volume 2

Preface

Volume II gives a descriptive view of the original Old Settlers in Isabella, Mecosta, and Montcalm Counties and has excerpts from Marguerite’s Journal, Making a Home. The first African American settler in Isabella County was Doraville Whitney who came in the fall of 1860.  The Whitney family married into the Norman family.  Violet Norman married George Whitney.  Violet was the daughter of Joseph H. Norman and Minnie Thompson, daughter of George and Mary Harding. The first African American settlers in Montcalm County were Lloyd and Margaret Guy who bought 120 acres of land in Bushnell Township on June 6, 1861.

The Old Settlers: Journey to Michigan (Volume I), outlines James Guy as one of the first settlers to Mecosta County in 1861.  The Old Settler communities have the first integrated schools in the State of Michigan.  The Oberlin School was located in Isabella County, Rolland Township and opened in 1867.  The Little River School in Mecosta County opened in 1880. 

The Old Settler families have ties to Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the United States and Sally Hemings through the Lett, Guy, and Tate families.  All of these families migrated to Michigan from the Lett Settlement in Muskingum County, Ohio. 

Warren Harding, 29^th President of the United States, is a direct descendant through the Norman and Nelson families.  The Hardings were ancestors of Ada Jane Harding, Mayles Nelson and Mary Harding, mother of Emma Todd, Lucinda Todd and Mary Lett-Harper, also the Charles and Myrtle Kettora Lett families.  Richard Harding was the first generation of Hardings who came to America.  He settled in Braintree, Massachusetts.  In 1623 Richard’s daughter married a descendent of Francis Cook, who came to America on the Mayflower. 

Benjamin Banneker (1731-1806) known as the first “African-American Man of Science,” (co-surveyor for the design and planning in the late 1890’s of the District of Columbia) has ties through the Lett and Guy Families. The 1860 Michigan Federal Census in Sodus Township, Berrien County, lists the Othias B. Lett family who were his direct descendants.  Their children’s names were: Rebecca, Jonathan, Esther, Harriet, Alben, Sophia, Emma, and Salina. Sophia Stevens was born 1815 in Berrien County, Michigan, and married Othias B. Lett (1810 - 1876).  Othias was the son of Samuel and Jemima Banneker-Lett and was born on December 20, 1833, in Muskingum County, Ohio.  Through Elizabeth Lett-Stevens, the Letts are descendants of Banneker.

          The initial Old Settlers in the three county areas were Grandison Norman, James Guy, Daniel and Thomas Pointer, Thomas Cross, James and Abraham Gross, Aaron Morgan, John Cummins/ings, John Harper, and Lloyd Ellsworth Guy.  This book is about the original settlers, and their journey to Michigan, and what happened once they settled in Isabella, Mecosta, and Montcalm Counties.

 Copyright © 2008. All rights reserved.