Scudder Association Foundation Announces New Online Journal
“The Foundation journal is dedicated to preserving and sharing the remarkable 385-year Scudder family heritage in America.
While our primary focus is on our philanthropic endeavors, we also have stewardship over many family records collected for more than 100 years. We begin anew by reviving our past efforts to correct old errors found in many Scudder genealogies online and even in print.
Our new Foundation journal, Scudder Family Historical & Biographical Journal, proposes to preserve an accurate and organized Scudder family record online. This will benefit Scudder descendants from three Scudder immigrant ancestors to New England who arrived 1635–1640; some family members can claim as many as fourteen generations of descent since. To preserve the Scudder family’s remarkable heritage, this journal features brief biographies and family histories, as well as articles that address important genealogical issues.
This journal is also a response to the professional suggestion by Jane Fletcher Fiske in her 1997 treatment of the Scudder family in “A New England Immigrant Kinship Network:”[1] “The Association had clearly been on the right track, but the material it published lacks organization.”
In this new effort, we honor significant efforts by our Association Foundation’s past genealogists who dedicated much time to assemble and disseminate data from a massive collection, diligently working within constraints they had prior to the digital age. The Foundation’s genealogical database is being reviewed and updated to improve its sources and will be hosted separately from the Foundation’s site. visit our sponsors to do your research.
Thirty years ago, in 1989, in an earnest effort to call attention to significant errors to be found in numerous Scudder genealogies circulating the globe, the editor of Scudder Searches, warned:
There are several old Scudder family history errors, some originating more than one hundred years ago, that still continue to raise their heads. Although all or most have been corrected in various issues of the Scudder Association Bulletin (published 1936–81), they seem to have a life of their own and just don’t go away. This note is intended to call attention to them and thus to lay them to rest, once and for all.[2]
David B. Scudder, editor, restated this problem in subsequent Scudder Searches as he continued to publicize corrections to past Scudder Family Association publications and other printed sources. To begin anew to overcome past errors, the journal will present first the most recent corrections that were made in Scudder Searches. This new Scudder Family Historical & Biographical Journal will organize this effort as it focuses first on earliest generations and again publicizes persistent errors that need correction.
Horton Kirby, Kent Home of Henry Skudder (Scudder)
After decades of work, it was not until the Summer 1992 issue of Scudder Searches that the Scudder Association was finally able to report it had full proof by primary sources that the father of Thomas (T), immigrant to Salem, MA was HenryA Scudder, yeoman of Horton Kirby, Kent. This same issue also published a transcription of HenryA’s will dated 29 Sep 1594; proved 5 Nov 1595 that will be republished in next month’s issue.
By the Winter 1993 issue of Scudder Searches, the Scudder Association had enough evidence to also confidently prove the accurate family relationship between immigrants Thomas (T) to his nephew John (J) and niece Elizabeth (E) and to prove their sibling relationship to each other. This may not sound like much to those who have not done original genealogical research themselves, but after a valiant 100-year intergenerational effort, it was very exciting for the Scudder Association to finally declare to the world with full confidence, its accurate English roots. The American Scudder family finally knew their common ancestor in England and his accurate place of residence in Kent, England. In this first issue of the Scudder Association Foundation’s new online journal we honor our past genealogists by reviewing a basic timeline of their work and methods of acquisition. Read Straight from the Horse’s Mouth
In this first issue, we repeat the article from Summer 1992, Scudder Searches, that announces the evidence to prove the patriarch of the American Scudder family which is repeated in Fiske’s TAG article. Henry Scudder, Yeoman of Horton Kirby, Kent, England:” Reprinted from Scudder Searches.”
*Painting by James Long Scudder, The Homestead, 1865, courtesy of the Huntington Historical Society.
[1] Jane Fletcher Fiske, “A New England Immigrant Kinship Network,” The American Genealogist, volume 72, (July/October 1997): 285-300. See her statement on page 290.
[2] David B. Scudder, “Family History Note,” Scudder Searches, Scudder Association, volume 1, no. 2, (Summer 1989): 2.
©Scudder Association Foundation, April 2019
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Excellent ministry
I’m part of Reformed churches in America. Our mother church is American Arcot mission. I’m presently serving as Bishop in Vellore . I’m going to give lecture on Ida Scudder’s Vision And Mission on the 15th of July
God bless
I’m interested to deepen my understanding on Scudder Mission Vellore