Silas Gallup was the second child of Ebenezer Gallup and
Susan Harden. The story goes that he
was a school teacher who fell in love with his fifteen year old student and
they married and rang the school bell to announce the marriage. Since no one paid attention, they kept the
marriage secret until the end of the term.
Silas and Phebe had a sizable family, their oldest being daughter Edith –
my great great grandmother. They farmed
in New York, but I suspect that they were never prosperous. Silas didn’t enjoy good health in New
York. I wonder if it was weak lungs or
perhaps he suffered from tuberculosis and the humidity caused issues. I don’t really know.
The oldest son of Ebenezer Gallup and Susan Harden was James
Gallup. James was married and out of the
house by the time he was twenty years old and married to Ellen “Nellie”
Schoonmaker. During the next twenty
years, James & Nellie had eight children, all born in New York State. Nellie died in 1872 and on 15 Mar 1873, James
married Elmira Saddlemire, and in a short period of time, James took his family
to La Salle Co., IL and most likely moved to Lyons, Burt Co., NE in the early
1880’s. Evidently, James liked what he
saw and wrote back and encouraged his younger brother to bring his family to
Nebraska as the weather was much more “healthful!”
So, on Thanksgiving Day in 1887, Silas Gallup and his wife
Phebe and many of their children boarded a train and left for Lyons, Burt Co.,
NE. They joined Silas’ brother James in
Lyons, NE and bought land and had their own place. Silas
and Phoebe had eleven children. Three of
the four oldest stayed behind in New York because they were already married and
had families of their own. The eight
other children traveled with their parents to Nebraska with only the youngest
returning to New York to live.
So after Silas went to Nebraska, I have no idea if his
health improved. He made that move from
New York when he was fifty six years old.
His youngest child, Hugh, was only a year old. After 10 years had passed, Silas died of
throat cancer (13 Sep 1897), leaving Phoebe to hold the family together. Their son, Everett Henry Gallup took care of
the farm with his brother, George, and son Albert worked as a teacher to help
out with expenses until he married and had his own family.
All that I really know of Silas Gallup are bits and pieces
that I have gleaned through the years. My
great grandfather never knew his grandfather because he had left New York
before he was born and died before Granddad came west. I know that Silas Gallup was a school teacher
and a farmer. Family legend has it that
he and his brother made the “famous” Gallup Salve that they had learned from
their father, Ebenezer. I know that it
existed because my grandmother remembered using it. She said that it had a gummy consistence and
worked wonderfully getting slivers out of the hand. I wonder what kind of ill health plagued him and
suspect that it might have been tuberculosis.
His wife Phebe out lived him by thirty years, dying in 1927. I’m not sure that my great grandfather had
terribly affectionate feelings for his grandmother. When they came west after the death of his
parents, Granddad immediately found outside work and never lived with her. His younger siblings lived and worked hard
for her and their uncle at the farm.
Aunt Phebe cared for her grandmother her entire life and only married
after she had died. My uncle has an
amusing memory of his great grandmother.
He remembered going to see her and she was bedridden by that point. She would always reach under the bed…and he
wasn’t sure if it was the bed pan or the cookie tin.
James and his second wife, Elmira had one child, John Silas
Gallup. James did not outlive his
younger brother by much…and died on 11 Apr 1901 at the age of 72. His wife, Elmira, lived another eleven years
and died on 23 Mar 1912. John Silas Gallup
married Lucy Emmet Everett and stayed near the Burt Co., NE area for most of
his life. Dad and I visited Lyons, NE last fall. As we walked around the cemetery, I saw a lot of familiar names. Silas and Phebe are buried by each other with their son Everett Gallup. I don’t remember if I found them all, but of the eleven children of Silas and Phebe – eight are buried at Lyons, NE. Two of Edith’s children are buried there as well…so they have descendants of nine children buried in that cemetery. James and Elmira are also there along with their son John Silas Gallup and his family. Within that cemetery alone, there are over thirty six Gallups…all descended from two brothers who had moved from New York to Nebraska.
Left to Right - Back Row - Irena, Hugh, Alice, George, Everett
Left to Right - Front Row - Elizabeth, Albert, Phebe, & Fanny
Not pictured - Edith d. 1908, Helen, Susan d. 1919, & Allen
It is possible that I have Alice and Susan mixed up...but I don't think so!
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