10/13/2025
October 2025
Hello everyone,
Attached is the Baker "Did You Know?" fact for October 2025. I've been going through some old Baker files that were passed on to me and came across this paper written 50 years ago by Elizabeth Abel, Historian for the Baker Association, for the Baker Reunion in 1975. She takes us back into the past and describes what it "could have" been like when our Baker ancestors lived.
Enjoy
October 2025 Baker “Did You Know?” fact:
The following was written by Elizabeth Frances (Farrington) Abel (1915-2000) fifty years ago for the Baker Reunion held on August 9, 1975 at the Bemis Heights Grange Hall. Elizabeth served as the Historian for The Baker Association from 1957-1964 and again from 1983-1986. Her husband, Carlton Donald Abel, was the great, great grandson of Isaac Bloom Baker, the 8th son of James Baker.
BAKERS AND THE BICENTENNIAL
Today, will you come backwards with me in time, for imaginary glimpses of events in the Baker history, based on Baker records and their relation to the history of our country. We really should have spooky music and flashing lights to make such a transition, but if you concentrate, it shouldn’t be too hard: we are here in a Grange Hall, with many relatives, and although much has changed in our country and in the world, people are still the same, kinship is still warm, and the Grange is an institution to which early Bakers could easily relate, and to which many later Bakers have belonged and still belong.
So ---- forget that it is August 9, 1975 and come back to a Quaker meeting house in Dutchess County. The year is 1779. Our country has been at war since 1775, and the hardships drag on. Families are disrupted, men have died, times are hard. It is in many instances a Civil War, with neighbor turned against neighbor, as many people remained loyal to the Crown and could not sympathize with the ‘rebels’.
James Baker, Sr., a Protestant Episcopalian, had married Jemima Kirke, a Quaker. Quakers had come to this country as early as 1656, when they had been persecuted and driven out by the very people who had come earlier to seek their own religious freedom. The Quakers felt that they had to obey God’s laws even when those laws went against man’s mandates. They felt that war was contrary to the teachings of Christ, and they suffered much because they were conscientious objectors. Some Quakers in Philadelphia adopted the principles of James Logan, who considered a defensive war justifiable, but they were in the minority.
I’ve been thinking of the anguish of mind Jemima Baker, The Quaker, must have endured because three of their boys, Peter, William and Richard all enlisted in the war of the Revolution. Peter served four years, and was right here, in the battles of Stillwater. James must have felt that young James, being only eleven at the outbreak of the war, would be saved from having to be a part of it, but when he was fourteen, he went to serve under Col. Brinkerhoff’s Regiment. Our Baker history tells us that Jemima was a Quaker minister, but in that religion every man and woman is a minister. However, she must have been one of the leaders of the church. The Quakers taught not only freedom of worship, but no discrimination.
So picture yourselves at a Quaker meeting. Men are seated on one side of the plain building; women on the other. They are sitting on wooden benches, in silence, but their minds are intensely busy, and their spirits are actively listening for God’s help in problems. Young James has just told Jemima that he, too, is going to fight for the country’s freedom, and I think it likely that his father, although he might be fearful, was proud of the boy, From her acute suffering, Jemima finally breaks the silence of the meeting with a prayer; a prayer for understanding, for safety of her sons, for forgiveness that they felt called upon to go to war, for peace. One after another, the men and women speak, joining their prayers with hers. I like to think that she left the meeting with more peace of mind and, with more strength to face her daily tasks, which were many. At that time she would have had, probably, eight other children at home. When we think of people like the Bakers settling the country, we mean it literally!
Although Peter and William were later to take part in the War of 1812, the Bakers have served their country in every war since. I wonder how much of Jemima’s strength of spirit and teachings influenced her children’s and grandchildren’s lives?
James the second married Cornelia Westervelt, who died soon after giving birth to Peter in 1791. James later married Ruth Post February 15, 1795, who started married life with a small stepson and soon began to have a family of her own.
Now please turn your imagination on again and come with me to the Baker homestead on an early March evening in 1802. Thomas Jefferson is now President of the new nation, and is recorded as a many-sided and perplexing man. Brilliant, a revolutionist, an idealist and a sincere believer in the rights of man, he spoke for the masses and despised what he called “the aristocracy of wealth”, yet he himself owned 200 slaves, a large plantation and the grandest house in Virginia. James and Ruth Baker must have been bewildered at times by the national scene, just as we are today.
James and Ruth had moved north to Argyle, and then to Stillwater, in 1800. By then William, George, Joseph and Israel had been born. The country had settled down to peaceful pursuits and to settling homesteads. The fear of Indian and Tory raids was over, the surviving soldiers were back home, and good land was sought and settled. Our James had brought his growing family to a sightly place, a beautiful spot overlooking the river valley, with its river traffic, its King’s Highway, and its grandiose plans for a canal. At first they had lived in a small home near the foot of the hill, but now a homestead had been built, an ample building with colonial pillars in front, and with the north and south rooms divided by a spacious hall that extended to the family living room, which contained a huge fireplace and Dutch oven. It is in this family living room, in front of the fireplace, where James and Ruth are now sitting. Ruth is sewing baby clothing, and James is resting after a hard day’s work. The five little boys have gone reluctantly to bed. Ruth puts down her work and speaks wistfully to James: “You know I love each of our boys dearly, but it would be so nice if this next babe were a girl. A girl would be such a comfort to me, and a help in the house soon. I would love to dress up a little girl, and put her hair up in rags. Do you suppose?” James may have replied, “That sure would be nice, but we’ll take what the good Lord sends us”.
Of course you know that the good Lord chose to keep on sending boys. That particular one was Valentine, born March 13, 1802.
I wonder if Ruth didn’t hope with each child that she would have a girl. Perhaps James’ family was meant to be all sons to be the founders of families, but the way of providence are strange: James’ brother Samuel and his wife had nine daughters!
We’re only going to enter one more scene – so people who are sleepy can begin to wake up!
Ruth’s childbearing years were 29, from 1795-1824, and she must have been a very strong woman! She was 17 when she married James, and 46 when the youngest boy, Parris, was born. In the meantime, her earlier sons were fathering children, some of whom were older than her younger ones. Peter, for instance, had five children and William one or two before Parris was born. To add to the statistics, have you ever counted the grandchildren? I came up with 99!
Now come with me to February 10, 1865, and the first reunion of the Baker sons at the old homestead. At that time, all but four of the sons were living within six miles of the old homestead, and most of them were farmers. David Sands Baker had died in 1853; Samuel in 1862. Others had felt the urge of the pioneer, and had gone west, Titus as far as Indiana. The east was getting too crowded for many adventurous spirits. James, the father, had died in 1840, and Ruth had died in 1854.
The country was again in turmoil wit the ending of the Civil War. Lee was soon to surrender in March and President Lincoln would soon be assassinated in April.
The brothers must have felt a sense of destiny, both in the country and in the family, as they met at the old homestead in the wintertime in 1865. The women were not invited to that reunion, nor the children, but I just can’t conceive of a bunch of men meeting without eating, and it seems as though Bloom Baker’s wife must have had help from some of the other wives in the preparation of the meal.
Now, I realize I’m looking at this all from a women’s point of view, but that’s natural. You men here can go in the living room to the meeting with the Baker brothers if you like, but I’m going to ask the women to come with me to the kitchen, with the wives. Can’t you imagine the smoldering resentment of the women as they worked? The men were speaking, perhaps, of national affairs as well as family affairs, and were, evidently, considering the women merely as cooks. I don’t know what form the rebellion took, nor who was the instigator, nor whether there was a definite plan of action or non-action? in which all participated to pressure the males – but the next reunion, the wives came; and on the third, it was a family affair.
Now let’s get back in our memory craft and return to the present: to the Bemis Heights Grange Hall on August 9, 1975, and the 111th annual reunion of the Baker family.
This has not been a star-spangled banner Bicentennial story. It has been part of a story of a big family who helped settle the new country, who fought in her wars, who migrated west, who branched out from mainly agricultural pursuits to every sort of occupation, whose descendants are scattered throughout the world. It is the story of a family, to quote Miss Ada M. Baker, author of “Three Hundred Years of Baker History: … “noted for their thrift, intelligence and integrity, and in that locality the name is synonymous with best citizenship”.
And that’s what the history of our country and the Bicentennial are all about!
Aug. 9, 1975
