USA > New Jersey > Genealogical and memorial history of the state of New Jersey, Volume III > Part 48
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The first Landon to come to LANDON Southold, New York, which was the first home of this fam- ily in America, was Nathan Landon, born in 1664, in Herefordshire, England, near the border of Wales; he sailed from Liverpool for Boston at the age of fifteen years. His
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John Franklin Fort
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wife Hannah died at the age of thirty years, and he died March 9, 1718. Four brothers of this name-Thomas, James, Daniel and David-removed from Southold to Litchfield, Connecticut, where the family had many repre- sentatives.
(I) David Landon, born in Southold, Long Island, married Mary Osborn, of East Hamp- ton, Long Island, and they removed to Litch- field, Connecticut. Children : Mary, born No- vember 22, 1739; Davis; Benjamin, March 8, 1744; Thomas, January 14, 1745-6; Nathan, August 7, 1748; Reuben ; Ebenezer ; Thankful, August 30, 1756; and Ebenezer, December 10, 1760.
(II) David (2), oldest son of David (I) and Mary (Osborn) Landon, was born Octo- ber 13, 1741, and married Chloe Buell, of I.itchfield. Children: Temperance, born De- cember 9, 1762; Ozias, October 28, 1764; Thaddeus, December 1, 1766; David, April 6, 1769; Asahel; Chloe; Idea ; and Sina.
(III) Asahel, fourth son of David (2) and Chloe (Buell) Landon, was born August 6. 1772, at Litchfield, Connecticut, and removed to South Hero, Vermont. His children were : Hiram, Judson, Reverend Seymour, Asahel, Milo and Sybil.
(IV) Rev. Seymour Landon, third son of Asahel Landon, was born in 1798, at Grand Isle, in Lake Champlain, New York, and died in 1880, at Jamaica, Long Island. He was a Methodist clergyman, and, as was the custom of many at that time, rode over circuits and preached at the various country churches or other buildings as opportunity offered. He married Phebe, daughter of George Thompson, of Ticonderoga, New York, and their children were: Dr. Stephen, Mary, Louise and Thomp- son H.
(V) Rev. Thompson Hoadley Landon, sec- ond son of Rev. Seymour and Phoebe ( Thomp- son) Landon, was born November 18, 1830, at Lansingburg, New York. He prepared for Wesleyan University at Wilbraham Academy, graduating from Wesleyan University in the class of 1852. He taught at Amenia Seminary, New York, and was later vice-principal of the Pennington Seminary at Pennington, New Jersey. About 1860 he entered the Methodist Epicopal ministry as a member of the New Jersey conference. Later, when the Newark conference was formed, he joined that confer- ence, a member of which he has been till his death. One of his earliest appointments was at Franklin, or, as it is now known, Nutley, New Jersey. While pastor of the Methodist
Church at Little Falls, New Jersey, he mar- ried, May 18, 1864, Sarah, daughter of Thomas E. and Mary Ellen (Booth) Durland, of War- wick, Orange county, New York. Sarah Dur- land was born at Pulaski, Illinois, January 12, 1841. Their children were : Thomas Durland, born May 18, 1865: Dr. Seymour, August 21, 1867, residing at New Brighton, Staten Island, and Louise E., born August 29, 1869, residing . now as Mrs. Robert E. Whiting, at Evanston, Illinois.
Thompson H. Landon received the degree of A. B. on graduation, later was given the degree of A. M., and in 1907 was honored by the degree of D. D. from Wesleyan Univer- sity. As a Methodist clergyman his pastorates were: Belvidere, Phillipsburg, Montclair, Madison, Rahway, all in New Jersey; Port Richmond, New York : and Succasunna, Eliz- abeth and Paterson, all in New Jersey. In 1885 he took charge as principal of the Bord- entown Military Institute, Bordentown, New Jersey. Later with his son, Thomas D., as partner, the institute property was purchased and developed.
(VI) Thomas Durland, older son of Thomp- son H. Landon and Sarah Durland, was born at Belvidere, New Jersey, May 18, 1865. He attended various schools, public and private, the last being Wesleyan Academy, Massachu- setts. A short advertising business experience with Joseph H. Richards preceded his associa- tion with his father in the Bordentown Mili- tary Institute. He is vice-principal and com- mandant of the institute. In 1885 he enlisted in the National Guard of the state, and in 1885 went out as captain of Company A, Sixth Regiment, N. G. N. J. ; later was promoted to be major of the Third Regiment, New Jersey Volunteer Infantry, and later was elected lieu- tenant-colonel of the Third Regiment, N. G. N. J. As a military instructor he has had charge of different schools and organizations with success.
On June 29, 1892, Colonel Landon married Margaret A. Reese, daughter of Thomas N. Adams, of Bordentown. They have three chil- dren, born in Bordentown: Margaret, Louise and Elizabeth.
Governor John F. Fort was born
FORT in Pemberton, Burlington county, New Jersey, on March 20, 1852, and is the son of Andrew H. Fort, who still lives in Mount Holly. His father was in 1866- 67 a member of the House of Assembly, and his father's brother was Governor George F.
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Fort, who held the executive office from 1851 to 1854. Young Fort remained in Pemberton until he was twenty-one years of age, leading the life of a farmer's boy and having his share of the country boy's hardships. His early edu- cation was secured in Miss Nicholson's private school in Pemberton, and after that he went to Pemberton Academy, where his teacher was Charles E. Hendrickson, a warm personal friend and in recent years his associate on the Supreme Court bench. His next tutor was Will- iam Hutchinson, afterward well known as "John Sands," under which name he wrote articles for the New York Sun. He then went to Mount Holly Institute, conducted by Charles Aaron, and from there he went to Pennington Seminary, where he graduated in 1869.
In the fall of 1869 Mr. Fort entered the law office of former Chief Justice Edward M. Paxton, who was then a well-known practicing lawyer in Philadelphia, but six months later he returned to New Jersey because of Mr. Pax- ton's appointment to a common pleas judge- ship by Governor Gerry of the Keystone State. Upon his return he entered the office of Ewan Merritt in Mount Holly, and in order to help pay his expenses while studying he taught school at Ewanville. He was also in the office of Colonel Garrit S. Cannon at Bordentown, from which place he went to the Albany Law School, where he graduated in 1872 with the degree of LL. B. Among his most intimate friends and housemates at the law school was former Chief Judge Alton B. Parker, candi- date on the Democratic ticket for president of the United States in 1904. This friendship still continues.
Returning from law school without having attained his majority, he again entered the office of Ewan Merritt, and in November, 1873, having just passed twenty-one by a few months, he was admitted to the bar.
When Mr. Fort returned from law school the Greeley-Grant campaign of 1872 was in progress, and he entered that campaign for General Grant with vigor. During the next three months he made twenty-seven speeches in South Jersey. In the winter of 1873 he was made assistant journal clerk of the assem- bły and he also held the same position in 1874, earning money enough to reimburse his father for every cent the latter spent on his educa- tion.
Mr. Fort went to Newark upon the advice of John W. Taylor, then president of the sen- ate, who was at that time the senator from
Essex. Hardly had he settled in Newark before he became interested in politics, and in 1874 he went on the stump for George A. Halsey, the Republican candidate for governor. In April, 1876, Mr. Fort married Miss Char- lotte Stainsby, daughter of former State Sen- ator William Stainsby, of Newark.
In 1878 Governor McClellan appointed Mr. Fort a judge of the First District Court of Newark, and he was reappointed by Governor Ludlow, but resigned the office in 1886 to en- gage solely in the practice of the law.
In 1884 he was elected a delegate at large by the Republican state convention to the ·na- tional convention held at Chicago. At that place, with six others, he acted independently and voted for George F. Edmunds, of Ver- mont, for president, until the latter was drop- ped, and then voted with the rest of the New Jersey delegates for James G. Blaine, whom he loyally and vigorously supported after the convention. In 1889 he was chairman of the convention which nominated General E. Burd Grubb for governor, and toured the state with him, and was greatly disappointed at his de- feat. He was also chairman of the Griggs convention in 1895, and was a speaker with the latter in the "whirlwind" campaign of that year, which resulted in the election of the first Republican governor in thirty years.
In 1896 Mr. Fort was a delegate to the na- tional convention at St. Louis at which Mc- Kinley and Hobart were nominated, and speak- ing for New Jersey, he placed the name of Garret A. Hobart before the convention. He was also chairman of the committee on cre- dentials at this convention, and presented the majority report for that committee, which read J. Edward Addicks, of Deleware, out of the Republican party. Judge Fort's speeches denouncing Addicks and later nominating Hobart gave him a national reputation as an orator. He was also a delegate at large to the Republican national convention of 1908.
Governor Griggs appointed Mr. Fort judge of the Court of Common Pleas of Essex coun- ty in December, 1896, and on May 4, 1900, he was appointed a justice of the Supreme Court by Governor Voorhees. The date of his ap- pointment was the anniversary of the date of his coming to Newark. While a member of the Supreme bench, Justice Fort sat in many of the counties of the state and made friends in all. He has presided over the courts of Atlantic, Morris, Monmouth, Middlesex, Ocean. Union and Hudson counties. While
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in Monmouth county he directed the move- ments which drove the gamblers from Long Branch in 1902.
Governor Fort has made speeches in differ- ent parts of the country on various subjects by request. In 1899 he made a tour of Euro- pean prisons under a commission from the United States, and reported on them on his return. The idea of probation and indetermi- nate sentences was such a new one that when Governor Fort drew the original bill providing for them for New Jersey, he had trouble in getting any one to father it. A hearing was given on the bill, and the Governor appeared in its behalf, with the result that it passed by unanimous vote in each house with the excep- tion of one man.
He was elected Governor of New Jersey for a term of three years, on November 5th, 1907, by a plurality of 8,013 over Frank S. Katzenbach, Jr., the Democratic candidate, the vote standing: Fort, Republican, 194,313; Katzenbach, Democrat, 186,300; Mason, Pro., 5.255 ; Krafft, Soc., 6,848; Butterworth, Soc .- Lab., 1,568.
Governor Fort was nominated for governor by one of the largest and probably the most turbulent conventions ever held in the state. He had the support of a majority of the so- called regulars, and a part of the "New Idea" faction of his party. He was at that time a Justice of the Supreme Court of the state, and actually sitting in a conference of the court at the time of his nomination. He immediately resigned his judicial office and appeared before the convention and accepted the nomination in a notable and independent speech.
The platform on which he was nominated was progressive along all lines. It contained a pledge to favor among other things, the following: An effective primary law for the expression of choice for United States senator ; reform of the petit jury system and the selec- tion of grand juries ; extension of the primary law, and the prevention of fraud at the pri- maries ; a Public Utilities Commission, with power to regulate such corporations effective- ly ; the maintenance of the Bishops law, so- called, which regulates the saloon ; the continu- ance of the good road policy of the state; an amendment to the State Constitution to elect members of the House of Assembly by dis- tricts; the abolition of useless commissions and departments, and the consolidation of others; a general and effective civil service statute.
During his term much effective and valu-
able legislation has been enacted. Among others: A general civil service act, which has proven very useful; a public utilities bill with a reasonable power, but not as broad as the Governor desired; a highway system through- out the state, in connection with a state high- way along the Atlantic ocean; the opening of an inland waterway between Bay Head and Cape May, through the various bays and arms of the sea of the state; reforms in state insti- tutions; extension of the direct primaries to the selection of county committees; laws to protect the various reservations of the state, and to prevent forest fires from sparks from locomotives ; a scheme for the establishment of a State Park at Washington's Crossing on the Delaware ; the improvement of the general system of finances of the state; a commission of experts to revalue the railway property of the state for purposes of taxation; statutes modifying the law as to accidents at railway crossings ; general act modifying the doctrine as to liability of employers for accidents to employes; the creation of a commission to recommend to the state a law for the estab- lishment of a general system of compensation for injured employes ; an act providing for the retirement of judicial officers after long and faithful service, on one-third of their salary ; general acts for the conservation of the waters of the state, and preventing their transporta- tion from the state; statutes providing for the uniting of various cities in the construction of municipal plants through the State Water Supply Commission for the supply of water to municipalities ; a law protection against fraud in the transmission of moneys to foreign points by private bankers.
He has looked into the affairs of all state institutions and departments more closely than any previous governor, and has suggested many reforms therein. His motto has been "Do only for the State," and neither party nor friendship reasons have had the least influence in moulding his action. His independent course has given him great strength with the people, and correspondingly lessened his influence with the political organizations and time-servers.
His campaign was the most thorough and active ever undertaken in the state, the auto- mobile for the first time being brought into use. His inaugural address was publicly com- mended by President Roosevelt as a remark- able state document. It's keynote was "keep party pledges." During his whole term, in message and address on all public occasions, he has stood for that principle.
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His party leaders soon broke with him, be- cause they could not use him, and because he insisted that a political pledge was as sacred as any other, and because he stood for progres- sive legislation for the regulation of corpora- tions. All legislation against the interests of the people has been killed during his term.
Governor Fort, during his term, has vetoed more proposed legislation than probably any other governor in the history of the state, there having been sixty-eight vetoes during the session of the legislation of 1910 alone.
Governor Fort removed from Newark to East Orange in 1889, and has lived at 51 Ar- lington avenue, north, in that city, since that time. He has three children : Miss Margretta Fort, Franklin W. Fort, a lawyer in Newark (see forward), and Leslie R. Fort, editor of the Lakewood Times and Journal. The Gov- ernor attends the Presbyterian Church and is a trustee of the Munn Avenue Church at East Orange and the Spring Lake Presbyterian Church, at which latter place he owns a sum- iner cottage and spends five months in the year. He was active in St. Paul's Methodist Episcopal Church for many years when in Newark.
He is a man with few recreations. He en- joys riding a horse, annually finds pleasure in a shooting trip south and has lately taken up golf. He was devoted to the law and his judicial duties, and he found them a delight. He is no respecter of persons; rich and poor approach him with equal ease. He probably knows as many people as any man in the state. He was president of the Sons of the American Revolution of New Jersey from 1905 to 1909, and is a member of the American Bar Asso- ciation and the New York and East Orange Republican Club, Essex Club and the Lake- wood Country Club. The degree of LL. D. has been conferred upon Governor Fort by Dickinson College, Seton Hall College, New York, and Union Universities, and Rutgers and Middlebury Colleges.
Franklin William, second child and eldest son of John Franklin and Charlotte (Stains- by) Fort, was born in Newark, New Jersey, March 30, 1860. For his early education he was sent to the Newark Academy, then attend- ing the East Orange high school, was prepared for college at the Lawrenceville Academy, and entered Princeton College, from which he was graduated in 1901, the year in which he at- tained his majority. After leaving college he read law with the firm of Sommer & Adams, in Newark, and at the New York Law School.
He was admitted to the bar of New Jersey as attorney in June, 1903, and as counsellor in June, 1906. He has served as recorder of East Orange, and is now secretary, treasurer and counsel for the Anglo-American Varnish Company, and secretary and counsel for the Newark Safety Razor Company. In politics he is a Republican. He is a member of the Union League Club of the Oranges, the East Orange Republican Club, the New Jersey Au- tomobile Club, and several Princeton College Alumni Associations.
Mr. Fort married, in East Orange, January 25, 1904, Emita H. Ryan, only child of Colonel Abraham and Emma A. (Hitch) Harris Ryan. Her father, Colonel Ryan, made a distinguish- ed record in the civil war. Children of Mr. and Mrs. Fort: Franklin Ryan, born Septem- ber 26, 1905; Barbara, October 5, 1908.
The Rev. Franciscus Dough- DOUGHTEN ty (the name has been writ- ten in the records : Doughty, Doughten, Doten, Doty, Dotey, Doghtey and Dohtey) was a member of the ancient and honorable family of Doughty of Easher, Surry and Boston in Lincolnshire, England, and de- scended from an English Saxon house of the Dohtey that dates back to 1066 A. D. Since the time of Henry VIII. the English family have continuously spelled it Doughty. The American immigrant was of the younger of two English branches of the house of Doughty and now absorbed by the noble house of Doughty- Tichbourne. The coat-of-arms of the Dough- ty family are: Arms: "Two bars between three mullets of six parts sable pierced." Crest : A Cubit arm erect per pale crenelle cuffed of the first holding in the hand a Mullet as in the arms." Motto: "Palma non sine Pulvere," translated freely means: "Nothing obtained without labor."
(I) Francis Doughty (Doughten) was an English clergyman, educated in one of the universities of England and a very learned man. He came to America in 1633, by way of Holland, and settled at Plymouth in Plym- outh colony, which colony had been in exist- ence for twelve years and was made up of Pilgrims who had escaped to Holland from religious persecutions in England, and thence for greater freedom to the New World. The first Pilgrims in America were the passengers of the "Mayflower," who landed December 20, 1620, and founded Plymouth colony. Francis Doughty had, like the other Pilgrims, left Eng- land and found refuge in Holland, where under
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the protection of the government of the Neth- erlands he sought to enjoy freedom of con- science according to Dutch Reformation. With full faith in the fellowship in purpose and de- sign professed by the "Mayflower" passengers, he left Holland for America and arriving in Plymouth in 1633 settled there. He soon found his conscience not in accord with the views of the Pilgrims on the subject of infant baptism. At Cohasset, on the northern bounds of the colony, of which church he was minister in 1642, he publicly asserted "that Abraham's children should have been baptized," and for this teaching he was dragged out of the assem- bly and harshly used. He sought refuge first in the Colony of Connecticut and then at New- port, Rhode Island, and finally in New Amster- dam, where he sought protection for freedom of thought and speech from the Dutch author- ities. He was induced by Governor-General Kieft to settle there and establish a colony on Nassau Island. To this end the director gen- eral granted· and conferred on him a patent which is recorded in the office of the secretary of state of New York at Albany in book of patents C. G., page 40, and bears date March 28, 1642. It covers thirteen thousand three hundred and thirty-three acres of land, which embraced all the town of Mespacht (Mespath) (now Newton) and included a part of the town of Flushing. The patent granted him manorial privileges as patroon and his power was absolute. He added a few families to his settlement at Maspeth, Long Island, the first year, but the war that broke out between the English and Dutch governments resulted in the settlers being driven from their lands and some of them were killed in their resistance to the orders for ejectment, and they all lost most of their possessions in their hasty flight to Manhattan Island, where they sought protec- tion from the English government, to whom all the English refugees resorted at this trouble- some time. Master Doughty was made the minister to the English refugees, and he was the first clergyman to speak in the English language on Manhattan Island. As the lands had been seized and he was without money, his repeated efforts to re-establish his colony on his Mespath grant proved futile. Fearing that his persistence might hinder other settlers from founding a village there, a suit was enter- ed against the minister and by it his rights in the lands were confiscated. He appealed to Director-General Kieft, but the director's answer was that no appeal lay from his judg- ment which was absolute, and Minister Dough-
ty was imprisoned and fined twenty-five gilders, but he was released at the end of twenty-four hours. He was not only the first minister to preach on Manhattan Island in the English language, but he was also the first English pastor of the first Presbyterian church estab- lished in Brooklyn. He soon after went to Flushing, where he found a safer religious home in the Society of Friends. His sister, who accompanied him to Maryland when he left Flushing, married Governor Stone, second governor of Maryland, under Lord Calvert. Minister Doughty died in Maryland.
Francis Doughty married Bridget Stone, a sister of Governor Stone, above referred to. Children : I. Francis. 2. Charles, married Elizabeth, daughter of John and Elizabeth (Seaman) Jackson. 3. Elias, had a grant of two hundred acres of land between Jamaica and Hempstead, and settled his children there. 4. Jacob, see forward. 5. William. 6. Maria, married Dr. Adrian Van Der Donck, and be- fore her father left Maryland he conferred on her, at her marriage, his farm on Flushing Bay. The land granted to these sons was ob- tained through a petition made by Francis, Charles, Elias and Jacob as compensation for the six thousand six hundred and sixty-six acres at Maspeth granted to their father by Director-General Kieft, and of which he had been wrongfully deprived.
(II) Jacob, fourth son of Rev. Francis and Bridget (Stone) Doughty (Doughten), was born in Flushing, Long Island, March 14, 1671. His wife Anne was born September 17, 1679. They were both members of the Society of Friends, and in 1714 they left Flushing, with eight children, and carried with them a certificate from the Flushing Friends to the Chesterfield Friends Meeting in Burlington county, West New Jersey, where they had de- cided to settle. Before they left Flushing their daughters, Abigail, Deborah and Ann, had died the same year, 1713, Abigail at the age of sixteen years and Ann at three years ; three daughters were born to them in Chester- field and named Abigail, Deborah and Ann for the three deceased. On their arrival in Moores- town, Burlington county, they were welcomed by the Chesterfield Friends Meeting, their cer- tificate being read on the Ist of 2 month, 1714. In Burlington county Jacob Doughty was one of the members of the general assembly and one of the signers of a congratulatory address to the English government on the defeat of the Scotch rebellion. On May 25, 1716, he was one of several Quakers who added their
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names to the official addresses of congratula- tion concurring in the matter of the address, but making some exception as to the "stile." He appears as having received of the receiver general £3400 in 1713, and £1000, March 13, 1723, for services as member of the colonial assembly. Hewas an executor of the will of Ann Beck, of Chesterfield, September 1, 1716 ; of the will of John Bunting, senior, March 8, 1714, and of the will of William Stevenson made April 24, 1724. He was appointed one of the three judges of Burlington county, March 19, 1721. On February 12, 1728, he bought of the exec- utors of William Stevenson one hundred and thirty-eight acres of land in Amwell township,. Hunterdon county, New Jersey. On March 30, 1733, he conveyed to Samuel Large, Sam- uel Wilson, John Stevenson, Edward Rock- hill and Joseph King trustees, four acres of the Amwell land for Friends Meeting House, first called Bethlehem Meeting, next King- wood Meeting and later Quakertown Meeting. On May 25, 1716, he was a member of the colonial assembly, and in the record is put down as a "Quaker." He was also a justice of the peace and appears as a prominent citi- zen of Burlington county.
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