Oswego Family Tied to the First Thanksgiving

For Catherine Anderson, the story of the Mayflower and the first Thanksgiving hits a little closer to home than for most.

The Oswego resident’s grandmother, Kathleen Leslie, was a member of the Society of Mayflower Descendants. Leslie passed away about 15 years ago at the age 98, and the family’s history can be traced back to William Bradford, who was aboard the Mayflower.

“It was just a part of who we are,” Anderson said. “It always amazed me when people would be so in awe.”

Bradford was the second governor of Plymouth Plantation elected in 1621, and would have played a key role in the first harvest festival later that year,  said the Rev. David Jay Webber, himself a descendant of Bradford and an expert on the family's history.  The harvest festival would later become known as Thanksgiving, and it did not become a national holiday until President Abraham Lincoln declared it so in 1863.

Bradford would govern Plymouth until his death in 1657 at the age of 68. Webber, who is Pastor of Redeemer Lutheran Church in Scottsdale, Ariz., said several famous Americans can trace their roots to Bradford, including Clint Eastwood, Noah Webster and Christopher Reeve. 

Anderson said she remembers as a child her mother showing her documents detailing the family’s genealogy. In second-grade, as her teacher was reading to the class about the Pilgrims traveling to the United States on the Mayflower, Anderson told her classmates someone in her family had been aboard the ship.

“I remember my teacher saying, ‘That’s a lie. You shouldn’t be lying,” Anderson said with a laugh. “It was pretty crazy.”

Anyone who arrived in Plymouth as a passenger on the Mayflower is considered a Pilgrim, with no distinction being made on the basis of their original purposes for making the voyage, according to the Society of Mayflower Descendants website. Proven lineage from a passenger, approved by a Historian General, qualifies one to be a member of the General Society of Mayflower Descendants.

Anderson's family had a desk from the Mayflower, and a parchment, which her uncle gave to the Smithsonian after Leslie’s death.

Anderson said she enjoys knowing her ancestory and because of her ties to the Mayflower, she can also register with the Society of Mayflower Descendants.

“It’s very cool to know where your family comes from,” she said.