Germanicus Kent
Germanicus A. Kent (1791–1862) together with Thatcher Blake and Lewis Lemon founded Rockford, Illinois, United States in 1834.
Biography
[edit]Germanicus A. Kent was born in Suffield, Connecticut, in 1791 and attend Yale College.[1][2][3] Around 1822, Kent moved to Huntsville, Alabama, establishing himself as a dry goods merchant, marrying Arabella Amiss of Blacksburg, Virginia, on June 7, 1827.[1][2][3] Kent was later a cotton merchant as a partner in the firm of Patton, Donegan & Co at the Bell Cotton Factory on the Flint river near Huntsville.[3]
The Kent family, including Lewis Lemon, a slave purchased by Germanicus as a boy, relocated to Illinois in 1834. After exploring the local area, Kent, Lemon and Thatcher Blake, a school teacher and farmer from Oxford, Maine, founded the settlement that was later to be called Rockford in 1834-1835.[1][2][3][4] Germanicus and Arabella's daughter, Mary, was born in Rockford in 1836. They also had younger two sons called Lewis and John.[1] In 1843, the Kent family returned to Arabella's hometown of Blacksburg, Virginia.[1][2][3] Arabella died on May 26, 1851, and from 1856 Germanicus lived with his daughter, (now Mary Black) in Blacksburg until his death on March 1, 1862.[3]
Memorials
[edit]
In 1976, a statue called "Pulling Together" depicting a stylized scene of the founders of Rockford dragging their supply wagon through a swamp was unveiled as part of the Founders Memorial on Wyman Street Bypass, Rockford.[5]
References
[edit]- ^ a b c d e Papers of the Black, Kent, and Apperson families, Ms74-003, Special Collections, University Libraries, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
- ^ a b c d Carlson, Anna (December 1995). "Kentsville, Haightsville, Midway, Rock Ford". Illinois History - A Magazine for Young People. 49 (1). Old State Capitol, Springfield, Illinois: Illinois Historic Preservation Agency: 16–18. Archived from the original on August 10, 2011. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
- ^ a b c d e f Church, Charles (1900). History of Rockford and Winnebago County, Illinois - From the First Settlement in 1834 to the Civil War ((Photographically Reproduced in 1985 by Leonard and Mary Adrignola) ed.). The New England Society of Rockford, Illinois. pp. 26–32.
- ^ Decker, Taylor (1981). Germanicus A. Kent: Founder of Rockford, Illinois, 1834. Rockford, Illinois: Rockford Historical Society.
- ^ "Statues commemorate Rockford founding". The Register Republic. Rockford, Illinois. December 8, 1976. Archived from the original on October 10, 2013. Retrieved October 10, 2013.
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