Szudy.com

Happy 200th Birthday to my great-great-great grandfather, Adam Dunlap, who was born December 18, 1813 in Marcellus, Onondaga County, New York. History nerds may be interested to know that just over 150 miles to the west, British troops were preparing for their sneak attack on Fort Niagara that would be launched late at night on the 18th. Adam’s parents, John and Nancy Dunlap, were natives of Ireland and came to the United States just two years earlier, in 1811.

Adam lived in Marcellus until 1844, when he moved to Sauk Prairie with his wife, Harriet (Lybolt) Dunlap and his eldest child, Erin. It was two or three years after this that he moved to what is now known as Dunlap Hollow in the Town of Mazomanie. With the help of Thomas Snatchel/Snachell (a friend from Sauk Prairie), Adam built the stone house in which I grew up. The Adam Dunlap Farmstead is listed in the National Register of Historic Places. Several of the original stone farm buildings are still standing, though one of the barns was dynamited back in the 1920s or 1930s because it was feared that it would collapse…a corner of that building still stands defiantly.

Adam and Harriet had 10 children:
1) Erin (1843-1906) served in the Civil War and was a grain buyer in Minnesota after the war. He married Mary Agnes Jewell and had three children: Adam, Harriet and Clara.
2) John H. (1847-1888) lived with Adam in his adulthood and stood to inherit the farm, had he not suffered an untimely death due to asthma. He married Emily A. Taylor and had six children: Jessie, Ida, Mary, George, Alma and Stella.
3) Sarah J. (1847-1847) died young…probably a twin of John H.
4) Mary Ella (1849-1930) married Webster Emily and lived near La Crescent, Minnesota for most of her adult life. She had four children: Etta, Royal, Katherine and Burt.
5) Ervin (1851-1937), my great-great grandfather, began working the family farm after John H.’s death. Around 1912, he moved north–first to Mauston, then to Jim Falls. He married Mary Elizabeth McKee and had five children: Raymond, Mabel, Adam N., Guy (my great-grandfather) and Irene.
6) Emma (1851-1852) died young.
7) Elba (1854-1854) died young.
8) George (1856-1860) died young.
9) Jennie (1858-?) is one of the biggest mysteries of my family tree. She married William Davis/Davies in 1876 and had at least one child. She then married Clarence L. Kribs in 1895. The last time I can find her is in Minneapolis in 1900. I would welcome any and all information about what became of her.
10) Adam Jr. (Addie) (1861-1879) died of appendicitis when he was 17…a fact which was very strongly in my mind when I had my appendectomy at the age of 17…

Adam died May 30, 1901 and is buried in the family cemetery in Dunlap Hollow (on Shower Road, near the corner of Shower Road and Dunlap Hollow Road).