Can you help connect civil rights activist Bayard Rustin to the tree?

+18 votes
411 views
Civil rights and gay rights activist Bayard Rustin was one of the suggested people in last month's US Black Heritage connection thread (https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/1200079/help-connect-us-black-heritage-project-notables-for-march), and he hasn't been connected to the big tree yet. If anyone wants to jump in and work on it, we can post profiles connected to him here that need family members added or brick walls so other people can find places to start working out from.
WikiTree profile: Bayard Rustin
in The Tree House by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
It would help if you could list the expected path connection and relationship to Bayard for each of these suggested connections. I noticed that some have FamilySearch sources, so maybe the connection is demonstrated on FamilySearch, but without mentioning it within each added suggested person listed here, it's difficult to see how these fit together.

Thanks for all of these wonderful efforts, I know that it takes concerted attention and that should not go unnoticed!
Hi Fann,

Thanks for the encouragement! First, I want to clarify that all of these profiles and people already are connected to Bayard in WikiTree. The connection may be a way off (like an aunt's husband's stepmother's brother or the like). However, none of them are connected to the global WikiTree yet. Each profile represents a person who could be a springboard to add more profiles and eventually find that connection. (And if we don't, at least we've formed a huge community cluster and added research to WikiTree that didn't exist before.) I probably should have been clearer about that before, thanks for the poke.
Descendants of Joseph Homager, born 1828 in Pennsylvania, need to be added: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Homager-3

34 Answers

+6 votes
Benjamin Myers, we don't know much about him yet other than he was born about 1912 in Florida, was living in New York in the 1930s and went to be married in his wife's hometown in Pennsylvania in 1934: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Myers-18108

Benjamin is 4 degrees from Bayard: https://www.wikitree.com/index.php?title=Special:Connection&action=connect&person1Name=Rustin-64&person2Name=Myers-18108&relation=0&ignoreIds=
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
edited by Erin Breen
+6 votes
Joseph Lewis Burns, born 1883 in Pennsylvania - there's a census record that looks like a promising match to build off of or disprove: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Burns-15277

Joseph is 9 degrees from Bayard: https://www.wikitree.com/index.php?title=Special:Connection&action=connect&person1Name=Rustin-64&person2Name=Burns-15277&relation=0&ignoreIds=
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
edited by Erin Breen
+6 votes
Nora Greene Atwater, born around 1850 in Georgia. She has a lot of children and siblings to add:

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Greene-9058

Nora is 10 degrees from Bayard: https://www.wikitree.com/index.php?title=Special:Connection&action=connect&person1Name=Rustin-64&person2Name=Greene-9058&relation=0&ignoreIds=
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
edited by Erin Breen
I added Nora's children and some of their spouses. She still needs her parents and siblings added.
+6 votes
Susie Spann, born about 1907 in South Carolina, good census records to work from: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Spann-575
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
I added her parents, siblings, and siblings' spouses. Her father, McClain Spann is a bit of a mystery. Admittedly, I didn't look extremely thoroughly, but I haven't found him on any census before he was married yet. His sister's death certificate has some clues about where to start searching for their parents, though: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Spann-576
+6 votes
Harry Cooper, born 1897 in Pennsylvania: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Cooper-30893
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
+6 votes
Harry Purnell, born 1881 in Maryland, living with his family in Philadelphia in 1900 - https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Purnell-818
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
I've added Harry's parents, siblings, and some other relatives.
+6 votes
William Luff, born 1887 in Pennsylvania: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Luff-436
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
+6 votes
Effa Green Pernsley, born 1889 in Pennsylvania: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Green-40962
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
+6 votes
Terressa Cummings Williams Pernsley, born in 1898 in Pennsylvania, her mother was from Spain if that's your interest: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Cummings-7021
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
+7 votes
A couple of months back, I considered trying to work on a connection through his husband, whose profile is Unlisted. Not only does that make it impossible to connect family to the profile without the participation of the profile manager, but the last name is misspelled and the birth decade is wrong.
by Ellen Smith G2G Astronaut (1.5m points)
Your comment inspired me to go take a look at his husband's family, and it turns out his aunt already is connected to the global tree. She was married to a voice actor who did the original voice for the Trix cereal rabbit!

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Muir-3233
Hurray! That should connect Rustin, but it still would be nice to build more connections for him through his biological relatives.
+7 votes
I added profiles for his mother's husband, Arthur William John, and their eldest child Ruth. It's not going to help much however. Arthur William was born in Grenada and Ruth did not marry. I'll see if profiles can be made for some of the other children.
by Isabelle Martin G2G6 Pilot (576k points)
Thanks, Isabelle!
+6 votes
William Elbert, born 1867 in Pennsylvania: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Elbert-199
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
+8 votes
I posted this note on his father's profile (also, the sources are merely listed on his father's profile, rather than being inline with the narrative):

Though his parents are not yet known, it appears that the 1910 head of household was in fact Thanzin (Hopkins) Chambers (b. c. 1867), Archie's apparent aunt (misidentified as male in the transcription, but clearly female in the census record, above cited). His probable sister was Eva T (Hopkins) Tyndale/Tyndell (b. c. 1878), who had two teenaged sons in the household; and, lastly, probable brother was John C Hopkins (b.c. 1890).

Thus, it is probably safe to assume that both of his parents died between 1890 and 1910.
by Porter Fann G2G6 Mach 9 (98.1k points)
+5 votes
Algernon McCoy Atwater, born in 1908 in Georgia: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/McCoy-8593
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
+5 votes
Ida Dickerson, born 1891 in Georgia, living with her large family in the 1900 census: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Dickerson-3683
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
+5 votes
Alice Pennington Spann, born 1884 in Pennsylvania: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Pennington-5894
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
Added Alice's parents and siblings. Needs more research to confirm the parents of her father, Samuel: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Pennington-5897
+5 votes
Sidney Hill, born 1914 in Ohio, a teacher who was in the air force during WWII: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Hill-43728
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
+5 votes
Vernon Hoagland, born 1908 in New Jersey, plenty of family members with him on the censuses: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Hoagland-875
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
+5 votes
Clara Smitherman Porter James - born in the late 1890s in North Carolina, married at least twice, had children. Living with her mother and stepfather in 1920, mother and other family members in 1900. https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Smitherman-178
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)
+5 votes
Walter Johnson, born about 1910 in Pennsylvania, married twice: https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Johnson-105848
by Erin Breen G2G6 Pilot (346k points)

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